September Tapes Review
by Harvey S. Karten (harveycritic AT cs DOT com)August 30th, 2004
SEPTEMBER TAPES
Reviewed by Harvey S. Karten
First Look Media/THINKfilm
Grade: B
Directed by: Christian Johnston
Written by: Christian Johnston, Christian Van Gregg
Cast: George Calil, Wali Razaqi
Screened at: Review 2, NYC, 8/26/04
In my youthful days when I had considered doing a Ph.D. in Political Science, my intended topic was the Naxalite movement in India. The Naxalites, a movement with no more import today in South Asia today than the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee is in the U.S., was a Maoist organization dedicated to the violent overthrow of the Indian government. When I suggested the topic to my adviser, he gave me a look like the one sent by Michael Moore's way by a congressman who was asked whether he'd like to volunteer his son to the army in Iraq. A violent group like the Naxalites would hardly have much respect for an American scholar or for anything western, so that cockamamie idea went out the window.
Just when you might think that all such notions would be nuts, along comes Christian Johnson with a similar idea, which is to send an American "journalist" (actually an actor) into Kabul in September of 2002 with the aim of checking out the scene in Kabul and, later, in the northern areas near the Afghanistan border with Pakistan. The journalist had a strong motive to risk his life at a time that travel by Americans into Afghanistan was illegal since among the almost three thousand people killed on 9/11 was his wife, Sarah, who was on the ill-fated American airlines flight and left a frantic message on his answering
machine.
What emerges is a thoroughly original film, a hybrid between a genuine documentary and a staged story, the two woven together so closely that an audience could scarcely tell what was real and which parts were staged. The part of the journalist is performed by George Cali, an actor who uses the name Don Larson, or "Lars" for short, and who is being filmed from his origins at Heathrow airport in London to the Afghan capital by Sunil Sadarangani, called Sonny in the movie. His interpreter is Wali Zarif (Wali Razaqi), an Afghan-American fluent in both English and Farsi (what happened to Dari?), a guy who puts himself into as much danger as Lars throughout the excursion.
Lars is of the view, which is almost axiomatic, that stuff is going down in Afghanistan that the U.S. government wants us to know about as much as it wants us to see visuals of American troops sent home in body bags. A highlight of the trip is a visit to arms dealers where Lars wants to buy an AK-47, but when the deal is 86d by his interpreter, the dealers become enraged and threaten to kill the troupe. That looks like the real thing.
Continuing his narration as well as his acting, the journalist continues, heading to the northern regions where Osama bin Laden is allegedly hiding. At that point his principal interest is to interview Baba Jon, who is a leading bounty hunter out to get President Bush's promised 25 million dollar award for the head of the world's most infamous terrorist. His jeep is ambushed and Lars take pot shots at the attacking Afghan guerrillas, hitting a couple of them in what later becomes clear has been staged rather than actual.
The script by the director and Christian Van Gregg takes care of what the principal performers have to say. The others in the film speak without a written guide. Much credit should be afforded the cast and crew for presenting a genuine original in this hybrid film, though if you tend to get carsick, take along a pack of Compazine–the hand-held camera shakes throughout
the venture more than Chubby Checker and Elvis combined in a month of concerts.
Not Rated. 95 minutes. © 2004 by Harvey Karten
at [email protected]
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