Category: Documentary

By Joe Bendel. For one New Zealander, a Canadian, and a British subject sailing through Asia, straying off course became a capital crime. It was their profound misfortune to anchor within the territorial waters of Cambodia while the country was held in the inhuman grip of the Communist Party of Kampuchea, or the Khmer Rouge as they would subsequently be known. In 2007, Rob Hamill had the opportunity to testify on behalf of his late brother in the first trial of a Khmer Rouge official for crimes against humanity. Annie Goldson followed Hamill’s quest for justice, or at least a measure of closure, in Brother Number One, one of a handful of must see films at this year’s typically uneven 2012 Human Rights Watch Film Festival in New York.

The film’s title carries a rather odd double meaning. Pol Pot, the Robespierre of the nationwide genocide, was dubbed “Brother Number One” in Communist propaganda, whereas Kerry Hamill was the first of three brothers. Charismatic and athletic, the elder Hamill brother left New Zealand in search of seafaring adventure. The 1970’s still felt like the 1960’s for him and his mates, who were largely oblivious to the horrors underway in Cambodia.

Canadian Stuart Glass was killed during the attack on their small yacht, which was probably a small mercy. Hamill and the British John Dewhirst were captured and transferred to the notorious Tuol Sleng prison, commanded by Kaing Guek Eav, a.k.a. “Comrade Duch.” In his own words, Duch’s prisoners were to be “smashed.” This entailed torture, the extraction of a false confession, and an agonizingly slow execution.

As he prepares his “Civil Party” statement, Hamill visits the Tuol Sleng Genocide Museum and talks to the handful of survivors, getting a painful sense of his brother’s final months. He also interviews several former Khmer Rouge officials, who are not exactly forthcoming. More satisfying are his meetings with Dewhirst’s sister and his brother’s girlfriend, bonding through their shared grief.

Though it is an intensely personal story, Brother vividly establishes the scale and ferocity of the Khmer Rouge’s reign of terror. The walls of victim photographs at Tuol Sleng speak for themselves. We do learn a bit about Duch, the subject of The Bookkeeper of Death (recently seen on PBS World), but Rob Hamill is appropriately granted the floor throughout the documentary. Frankly, it is quite amazing how well he keeps it together as he confronts the ghosts haunting his family.

An Olympic rower at the Atlanta games, Rob Hamill is indeed a compelling POV figure. He certainly puts a human face on the nearly inconceivable tragedy of so-called “Democratic Kampuchea.” Yet, the documentary never feels manipulative or exploitative. Goldson wisely stays out of the picture, resisting the temptation of putting any sort of explicitly personal stamp on the film. Nor are there moments of quiet observational slack. Brother has a compelling narrative, which Goldson and her co-director-dp Peter Gilbert and co-editor James Brown hew to quite tightly.

Brother Number One clearly illustrates how vicious ideology can be. It also reminds viewers how one murder can devastate an entire family. As for resolution, that is another matter entirely. That is indeed why Brother Number One is a timely and important film. One of three highly recommended films at this year’s New York edition of HRWFF, along with Salaam Dunk and Ai Weiwei: Never Sorry, it screens this coming Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday (6/19-6/21) at the Walter Reade Theater, with Goldson and Hamill in attendance all three nights.

LFM GRADE: A

Posted on June 18th, 2012 at 4:51pm.

By Joe Bendel. There was no Title IX in Iraq under Saddam. In fact, the general idea of gender equity that motivated the landmark legislation remains scarce throughout the region. Yet, two years after its founding, the American University of Iraq, Sulaimani (AUIS) fielded a pioneering women’s basketball team. They never won a game during their first season. David Fine documents their second in the truly inspiring Salaam Dunk, which screens as part of the 2012 Human Rights Watch Film Festival in New York.

Their students are the future leaders of Iraq. Offering a rigorous academic program in the relatively sheltered environment of Sulaimani, AUIS makes a point of recruiting a cross section of Iraq’s population. As a result, the nascent women’s basketball team boasts a roster of Arabs, Kurds, Shiites, Sunnis, and Christians. They are led by Coach Ryan, a visiting American English lecturer. Tough but supportive, he is a refreshing antidote to all the wrong sorts of coaches who have made the news recently. However, everyone is keenly aware that his fellowship ends with the current academic year.

For students from Baghdad, Sulaimani is an island of stability, yet many still worry about their families. Nearly all team members have lost friends or family to violence. As Coach Ryan observes, his team has faced more in their still young lives than most of those watching their documentary will ever have to contend with. Not merely an extracurricular activity, basketball becomes something uniquely “theirs.” It bonds the young women together and gives them a sense of identity. They also want to win.

Probably no genre traffics in shopworn clichés like the sports documentary, but Salaam is something else entirely. When the coach consoles his team after a hard loss that their gutty performance is more important than a “W” or an “L,” it is not hollow. It is a profoundly heavy moment. Notions of sportsmanship and the “healing power of sport” take on very real meaning here.

Director-editor-co-cinematographer Fine gives viewers a full sense of players’ personalities, as well as that of their coach and student-manager. They are all bright and immensely likable. Indeed, the experience of AUIS in general and the women’s basketball team in particular appears to be a successful social catalyst, bringing the diverse team together, despite their religious and ethnic differences. This does not mean Salaam is uneventful. The AUIS team just saves their drama for the court (or the classroom or the debating society).

This is a great documentary. The term “crowd-pleaser” just does not cover it. While the circumstances of the Iraq War unavoidably hang over the young Iraqis, Salaam scrupulously avoids politics, as such. It is one of the best sports docs in years, but it is not really about games and stats. It is about a group of young scholars becoming athletes and leaders, who will inspire audience confidence in Iraq’s future. While the HRW festival is always a radically mixed bag, Salaam Dunk and the opening night selection, Alison Klayman’s Ai Weiwei: Never Sorry, the Sundance alumnus profiling the Chinese dissident artist, are two films that should absolutely not be missed. Highly recommended, Salaam Dunk screens this Saturday (6/16), Sunday (6/17), and Monday (6/18) at the Walter Reade Theater.

LFM GRADE: A

Posted on June 14th, 2012 at 11:29am.

Watch Civilization – Preview on PBS. See more from Civilization: The West and the Rest with Niall Ferguson.

By Joe Bendel. The Ottoman Empire’s decree banning printed type in 1483 was obviously a noteworthy historical event. According to economic historian Niall Ferguson, it was a particularly telling incident, emblematic of the increasingly sharp distinctions between the West and the rest of the world. Ferguson lucidly explains six key attributes or so-called “killer apps” contributing to the West’s ascendency for the last five hundred years or so – and pointedly asks if they are now beginning to shift to the East – in the two-part sweeping survey Civilization: The West and the Rest, adapted from his bestselling book of the same name, which airs the next two Tuesday nights on most PBS outlets nationwide.

One of Ferguson’s touchstone figures is a “Resterner” rather than a Westerner. During the reign of Emperor Yongle, the technologically advanced China was a relatively pleasant place to live, especially compared to the dismal conditions of Europe. However, Yongle’s successors would turn China’s focus inward, ceding the global stage to upstart Westerners. The West was well suited to capitalize because of those six killer apps: competition (first between grubby European city-states for prestige, and than in the more traditional capitalistic sense), science, democracy (particularly when coupled with widespread property ownership), modern medicine, democracy, and the work ethic.

While many of these might sound rather obvious, Ferguson puts each into a fresh perspective. Science would indeed seem like a glaring no-brainer, but not to the Ottomans. Just as the Catholic Church was relaxing its attitudes towards scientific inquiry, the Muslim religious authorities were taking an even harder line, including but not limited to the prohibition against type in favor of calligraphy.

Even when analyzing American history, the British historian offers some intriguing insights. Though public schools largely give short shrift to the founding of the Carolina Colony and the Fundamental Constitutions written by John Locke, Ferguson contends they represented an unprecedented opportunity for social mobility. In less than a decade, a despised member of the English underclass could bind himself into indentured servitude, receiving free and clear title to his own land holdings at the end of his term. As a property owning man, thereby entitled to vote, he became a fully vested member of the economic and political establishment.

While Ferguson largely avoids normative judgments, he makes time to critique what he dubs America’s “original sin,” slavery, and its bastard child, segregation. Yet, in keeping with his previous scholarship, Ferguson is more forgiving of European colonialism, especially with regards to the spread of modern medicine (in this case a kindly app) throughout Africa.

Of course, the central questions concerning Ferguson are whether the West still believes in its killer apps and if Resterners have developed better upgrades. This really comes to the fore during his discussion of the work ethic—the Protestant Work Ethic to be more precise. Here the Chinese are demonstrably outperforming the West, even America, by any standard of productivity. The real revelation, though, is the linkage Ferguson posits with the upsurge in Protestant religious observance in Mainland China. Ferguson’s observation: “today there may actually be more practicing Christians in China than in Europe” is a heavy statement rife with implications few are seriously grappling with. In no uncertain terms, China is identified as the Restern power to watch. Yet Ferguson never fully addresses the enormous disparities between the go-go coastal cities and the desperately poor rural villages, where consumerism and even modern medicine have yet to fully arrive.

Granted, Ferguson’s approach is somewhat anecdotal, but those stories are truly fascinating, more often than not. Naturally, compressing five hundred years into four hours will lead to odd allocations of focus. As a case in point, German sociologist Max Weber has at least twenty times more screen time than Lenin, Stalin, Hitler, and Bismarck combined. On the other hand, his scholarship withstands history’s scrutiny better than their ideologies.

Simultaneously erudite and telegenic, Ferguson is an almost chatty host, who could be accused of glossing over decades and even centuries with the wave of a hand. Yet he is dashed convincing, pulling viewers through his arguments, step by logical step. It all might sound dry, but it is surprisingly entertaining. Frankly, viewers will be rather sorry to see Civilization end, so to speak. Immensely timely and intellectually engaging, Ferguson’s Civilization is very highly recommended television. It begins this coming Tuesday (5/22) and concludes the following week (5/29) on most PBS stations.

Posted on May 19th, 2012 at 10:01am.