Film festivals have several purposes: to promote new films, provide a forum for directors and actors to mix with cinema enthusiasts and, in some cases, to bring a little industry attention to a town that?s off the beaten path. While the Maryland Film Festival, which concluded last weekend, provided a bit of all three, it also achieved the most important goal of a film festival: showcasing the unforgettable movies that may be the critical hits of tomorrow.
The documentary “My Country, My Country” illuminates the Iraq war with a sense of raw honesty that has been lacking from other offerings. The work of well-known documentary filmmaker Laura Poitraf, the film eschews the histrionics of Michael Moore?s polemic “Fahrenheit 9/11,” choosing to focus on the life of a saintly Iraqi doctor, Riyadh al-Adhaha, who decides to run for parliament. The doctor?s struggle is so utterly compelling, his faith in the idea of democracy so implacable, that he becomes the embodiment ofall the beauty and ambivalence of the Iraqi people as they struggle to salvage a country torn apart by war.
Watching al-Adhaha?s grown daughters, both college-educated, trapped at home trying to kill a fly while bombs explode in the background, or peering through hazy darkness as he makes a cup of coffee without the use of electricity, the claustrophobic realities of living amid combat are made clear. The doctor struggles to come to terms with the demands of his profession in a country lacking adequate medical care, passing out money to desperate patients, or staring implacably at his daughter as she declares, “This is not a life!” after hearing of the bombing of the mosque. The film connects the viewer to the war, and will perhaps give pause to those who only want to see the Iraqi conflict as a larger battle of ideologies or terrorism.
Similarly provocative, though not as well realized, is Matthew Porterfield?s directorial debut, “Hamilton,” shot in Baltimore. The film is equally stunning for the risks this young director seems willing to take. Following the lives of two young lovers as their paths intertwine ? and sometimes don?t ? in Baltimore, the director uses the distinctive character of the city?s streets, alleys, bus stops and underpasses as an active player in the film. The characters, who rarely speak, are revealed by the director?s keen eye for contradictory details, like a long silent ride in the car that is narrated by a radio playing Baltimore Club, or the late-night glow of a television screen.