Strange Culture: 2006, (Grade B)

Director: Lynn Herschman Leeson

Cast: Tilda Swinton; Thomas Jay Ryan; Peter Coyote; Josh Kornbluth; Beatriz da Costa; Steve Kurtz; Shoresh Alaudini, Cassie Powell; Larissa Clayton

Plot: a true story--done as docu-drama--but with the end not revealed-- about artist/professor Steve Kurtz, who, on the eve of an exhibit finds his wife dead from a heart attack. He calls for help and medics, suspicions of his art media, which included genetically modified foods, calls in the FBI . Kurtz is accused of bio-terrorism and his life is turned into a horrifying circus for the next few years.

sez says: not the best done documentary I've ever seen--but well enough done to get the story out--and what a bizarre and horrifying story it is!  It suggests our government is WAY out of touch with the intellegencia in the US --and if you want to buy into conspiracy theories--it suggests the government is seeking to censor, to dominate, the frighten, to control our society.

mjc says: I had no idea about this incident It was a sober reminder of the consequences of the Bush Years that still reverberate 

The Athlete, 2009, (Grade B)

Directed by Rasselas Lakew and Davey Frankel
Ethiopia, 2009 , 93 min.
Shown at the African Film Festival, Portland 2011

PLOT: Per the festival organizers... "Ethiopian track and field athlete, Abebe Bikila (1932-1973), was the first black African to win an Olympic medal, and ultimately the first man ever to win two Olympic marathons. This soft-spoken son of an Ethiopian shepherd shocked the Western world when he crossed the finish line barefoot at the 1960 Olympics in Rome. Mr. Bikila became an inspiration and a model for Africans everywhere, and the world of distance running would never be the same. But as The Athletedemonstrates in a seamless blend of documentary footage and dramatic rendition, Abebe Bikila’s greatest personal challenges still lay before him. The Athlete is Ethiopia’s first Oscar contender in the Foreign Language Film category, nominated for consideration for 2011."

sez says: exactly what the festival organizers said -- and well done--wonderful story--beautiful presentation. Uplifting all the way. 


mjc says: this is a story I did not know and was glad to see it told so well, and with a glimpse at Ethiopian landscape

STOLEN, 2009 (Grade B)

Directed by Violeta Ayala and Dan Fallshaw
Western Sahara, 2009 , 75 min.
Shown at the 21st African Film Festival in 2011, Portland Oregon

per the festival "Directors Ayala and Fallshaw set out to make a simple documentary about family reunions in Saharawi refugee camps controlled by the Polisario Liberation Front. Their project became much more complicated when they discovered that many of the dark-skinned refugees were in fact the slaves of those with lighter complexions. Or were they? Was there really widespread servitude or was it something more culturally subtle? The Polisario denied the filmmakers’ assertions, labeled them cultural imperialists, and tried to stop the project. The result is a powerful, suspenseful film, which raises thought-provoking questions about the possibility of documentary objectivity. The film has provoked an ongoing international controversy. Winner of the Best Feature Documentary Prize at the 2010 Pan-African Film Festival in Los Angeles.  In Hassaniya, Spanish, and English with English subtitles."

sez says: fascinating --this can be understood in so many ways that it is hard to even start to discuss it here.  Is this just a naive look at one example of actual slavery?  (It exists all over the place. It pops up regularly here in the US.  Sex slaves are on the rise again.  And what of wage salves?)  Or are they pawns in an international dispute between Morocco and the Polisario Liberation Frount?  Why dod so may people recant the stories they told the film makers?  Were they not understood --and paid to lie as they are accused of..or are those people under pressure from powers within their own communities and must recant to keep their families safe?  This list of questions is endless...but the  film is worth seeing becasue it will make you ask these questions about a pressing and often ignored social reality: THere are still salves in the world.  Humans still are bought and sold--and even STOLEN.  


mjc says: truth is slippery and slides sideways and creeps out from under rocks and bursts from the mouth's of children. I believe the filmmakers were searching for truth and I don't know if they found it.