07-04-09 Osama (2003)

Seen: April 4th, 2007
Format: DVD
Rating: 5

This is a very tough film for me to rate.

Essentially, there are two ways to consider this film.

One is as a cultural, personal and even political triumph. The film maker is Afghani, raised during the Soviet occupation. His passion for film lead him to study in Moscow. This is a tough choice for him as he abhorred the occupation, but couldn't deny his passion. He mae the film after the fall of the Taliban. It depicts life under the Taliban and the implications of their rule. Though fictional, it acts as a cultural documentary of this time in Afghanistan. As such, it is a remarkable achievement.

The second way to consider this film is solely as a film, judging based on writing, characterization, acting, composition, pace and all those other things which a director must balance and ultimately bring together to realize his vision.

This blog is about film, so I consider it using the second criteria.

Overall, this film is not outstanding. The story is simplistic and presented very linearly. It simply plods from one scene to the next. Where it could have been spare, it instead chooses to be literal. It strange in that is does show instead of tell, but shows in the most obvious and fundamental of fashions.

The characters are, with a few exceptions, one-dimensional. They appear and especially disappear without warning or explanation. They serve their purpose and are discarded. This does maintain focus in the story, but in the end feels disperse and incomplete. Perhaps this is intentional.

Symbolism and metaphor is heavy handed. There is little subtlety here. Things are rough and direct. Even deception is clumsy, yet overly effective.

There are technical merits to the film. The use of POV and re-use of scenes is interesting. The composition and framing, making use of the locales is often very striking and effective. The one quibble I have in this department is the editing, which I found very rough and intrusive. It had a tendency to chop off a scene and abruptly enter a new one. Again, perhaps this is intentional, but it irritated me during my viewing. In some case, the scene lingers far too long on a static ending shot. There is a lack of cohesion in the visual style of the film. Perhaps this is due to the filming locations and the way the film was made, but it feels more like a collection of vignettes than a complete vision.

You should ignore my rating and see this film if for no other reason than it offers an experienced view of life under the Taliban. I won't go so far as to say it's an objective view, but it is more so than anyone from "first" or "second" world country could produce. Its appropriate that the film doesn't meet my expectations, that it has "flaws", because it should be as foreign to me as Afghanistan itself.

The Good: Compassion in a child

The Bad: Justice based on the vagaries of interpretation

The Ugly: Lechery benefits from religious law