MIFF 2012 - Day 5
Doco day! And what documentaries they were. Damn this has been a good run. Though I've looked at my schedule and I fear the rot is going to set in around Friday. But I'll stay hopeful, coz it's been amazingly good so far.
The Ambassador
Mads Brugger made the impressive and ethically challenging The Red Chapel, where he took two disabled comedians to North Korea to subtly mock the regime. Now his form of reportage has taken a new twist, as he himself goes undercover to expose exactly how fucked up Africa is, and how post-colonial Europe really isn't that post-colonial. There exist brokers who can get you made a diplomat for an African government, in this case Liberia. This lets you go somewhere else, say the Central African Republic, and set up shop as a trader in blood diamonds with diplomatic immunity protecting you from certain repercussions. With enough money, you can buy your way into all kinds of things. You have to admire the guts of this guy, who documents an insane amount of illegal backroom dealing with seeming impunity. The rise of the DSLR as a video camera hasn't penetrated Africa yet, so his subjects are unaware his "Press Officer" is actually videoing the whole thing. It's incredibly funny, and seriously depressing, as you realise that foreign countries have a vested interest in ensuring that African states fail on a semi-regular basis. And they are quite active in pursuing that interest. In the international game of diplomatic soccer, Africa is the ball. The Liberian government has recently come out condemning Brugger and demanding his extradition, but since the filmmakers have the receipt for the ambassadorship they bought from the government there, it's hardly likely to eventuate. As a friend of mine recently commented, Africa is fucked. And here, you begin to understand exactly why on so many levels that's going to be hard to change.
The House I Live In
Speaking of depressing but entertaining and well-made, The House I Live In is a great analysis of "The War On Drugs" and it's several decades long impact on American life. With The Wire creator David Simon providing key narrative commentary as director Eugene Jarecki explores the many facets of the drug trade and drug enforcement, the picture of a self-sustaining system emerges. Whether intentional or not, the systems in place are destroying civil society. Police are rewarded for tackling the low hanging fruit of street dealers rather than solving murders and hunting down rapists. People in ghettos often have no prospects for earning a living outside of selling drugs. Entire towns depend on prisons to provide employment for the townsfolk. None of this really comes as a surprise, but what does surprise, however, is where the film takes this understanding of the systems at play. Jarecki begins the film with recollections of his family's history, fleeing persecution in Russia and Germany for a new life in America. And he brings those seemingly throwaway moments to a crushing conclusion as the case is made that the war on drugs is effectively a slow motion holocaust being perpetrated on the lower class of America. Written as a sentence it seems like hyperbole, but viewed through the lens of the documentary it's not so easily dismissed, and the statistics back them up. But the systems themselves are so completely woven into the fabric of society it's going to take a lot of work to unpick them. With a lot of interviews, personal testimonies and critical analysis, this is a great documentary full of humanity. It will depress you, but as with The Ambassador, it's only depressing because it shows you something very sad and very real.
The Ambassador
Mads Brugger made the impressive and ethically challenging The Red Chapel, where he took two disabled comedians to North Korea to subtly mock the regime. Now his form of reportage has taken a new twist, as he himself goes undercover to expose exactly how fucked up Africa is, and how post-colonial Europe really isn't that post-colonial. There exist brokers who can get you made a diplomat for an African government, in this case Liberia. This lets you go somewhere else, say the Central African Republic, and set up shop as a trader in blood diamonds with diplomatic immunity protecting you from certain repercussions. With enough money, you can buy your way into all kinds of things. You have to admire the guts of this guy, who documents an insane amount of illegal backroom dealing with seeming impunity. The rise of the DSLR as a video camera hasn't penetrated Africa yet, so his subjects are unaware his "Press Officer" is actually videoing the whole thing. It's incredibly funny, and seriously depressing, as you realise that foreign countries have a vested interest in ensuring that African states fail on a semi-regular basis. And they are quite active in pursuing that interest. In the international game of diplomatic soccer, Africa is the ball. The Liberian government has recently come out condemning Brugger and demanding his extradition, but since the filmmakers have the receipt for the ambassadorship they bought from the government there, it's hardly likely to eventuate. As a friend of mine recently commented, Africa is fucked. And here, you begin to understand exactly why on so many levels that's going to be hard to change.
The House I Live In
Speaking of depressing but entertaining and well-made, The House I Live In is a great analysis of "The War On Drugs" and it's several decades long impact on American life. With The Wire creator David Simon providing key narrative commentary as director Eugene Jarecki explores the many facets of the drug trade and drug enforcement, the picture of a self-sustaining system emerges. Whether intentional or not, the systems in place are destroying civil society. Police are rewarded for tackling the low hanging fruit of street dealers rather than solving murders and hunting down rapists. People in ghettos often have no prospects for earning a living outside of selling drugs. Entire towns depend on prisons to provide employment for the townsfolk. None of this really comes as a surprise, but what does surprise, however, is where the film takes this understanding of the systems at play. Jarecki begins the film with recollections of his family's history, fleeing persecution in Russia and Germany for a new life in America. And he brings those seemingly throwaway moments to a crushing conclusion as the case is made that the war on drugs is effectively a slow motion holocaust being perpetrated on the lower class of America. Written as a sentence it seems like hyperbole, but viewed through the lens of the documentary it's not so easily dismissed, and the statistics back them up. But the systems themselves are so completely woven into the fabric of society it's going to take a lot of work to unpick them. With a lot of interviews, personal testimonies and critical analysis, this is a great documentary full of humanity. It will depress you, but as with The Ambassador, it's only depressing because it shows you something very sad and very real.
posted by Andrew Lee at 12:40 AM
1 Comments:
http://bruggertheambassador.blogspot.com/ explains why THE AMBASSADOR is not a documentary nor a mockumentary, and reveals the inconvenient truth behind the story about what was left out.
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