It kills me how many movies there are about genocide. Terrible joke about terrible times. There was a documentary festival I attended a couple of springs ago in the north of Greece, and it was “the year of the child.” Which amounted to stern, aggrieved, rich, uncompromised glimpses of children at war, children starving, children murdered, children… you know the rest. “Pray the Devil Back to Hell” is a movie I resisted seeing on a couple of earlier opportunities. More than the average viewer, I’ve seen film after film after film the past couple years that are about the failings of man and very often hope is not offered in a practical sense, only in a we-shall-survive soft sort of hopefulness. The power of Virginia Reticker’s “Pray the Devil Back To Hell” is its subjects, an affiliation of Christian and Muslim women, mothers, wives, who resisted the eddies of genocide in Liberia in 2003, under the mad rule of dictator Charles Johnson. A second civil war kills a reported 250,000, displaces a million. Reticker cleanly lays out the stakes and the courage of the women. The film is shattering. They’re inspiring. Can they carry their message against civil wars anywhere on the planet? Liberia, a country founded by freed salves from America, now has its first female leader. Small steps… 72m. (Ray Pride)
Beanie Babies Make The Multiplex: How A24 Got the Brand Back Together A24 just turned ten; it was founded to release the kind of independent features that were cool yet commonplace at the turn of the century. The plan was to move beyond the mistakes that crashed earlier distributors they worked with. And they have made a mark in the past decade, at festivals and in theaters.
Seeing The Elephant: A Review Of Babylon The boisterous, brawling yet melancholy "Babylon," is a variation on film history, but more drawing for drama. It's gaudy and mean, celebratory and sorrowful.
