VIFF 2009 | Afghan Star at Schema : more than ethnic

VIFF 2009 | Afghan Star

Afghan Star
Afghanistan/UK, 2008, 88min
DIR: Havana Marking

A documentary about a contest of singers in Afghanistan, Afghan Star is one of the best feature length documentaries of the year. It starts with a pure moment, a young boy singing unaccompanied by anything except his own ardor. After his performance, he explains that the value of music is lifting us from sorrow.

From there, the film turns to following four contestants on the show "Afghan Star", including two out of the three women that applied out of 5 000 applicants. The music is transformed by vanity, rebellion, spectacle, and vote seeking, which makes the text of the show not much different from Canadian Idol. But in an Afghanistan of civil war and violent factions, where music itself has been banned, every preening performance possesses a gravitas that would be impossible elsewhere.

The film sheds light on the sometimes violent political tensions within the country by not seeking them out. Instead, the political encroaches on the music: a contestant is threatened with death after dancing and revealing her hair on stage; another is threatened simply for being on the show; and Taliban fighters vote for their favourite singers with their cell-phones. The depth of the issues is revealed in how a simple pop show becomes distorted by politics.

The film is also extremely intimate - both with its subjects and with Afghanistan itself. Scene-setting shots of cities or rural towns are not detached, exoticised depictions of the locale. Documentaries often shorthand a foreign locale by focusing on what is visually unique, like farmers herding sheep through a rubble strewn road. This film goes further and talks to the farmers. And it turns out they would have voted for Rafi.

Upcoming Screenings:

Thur. Oct. 15, 9:15pm, Empire Granville