Everyday Activist - Censored Voices (CIFF 2015)

Posted on Sunday, September 27, 2015 at 11:00 AM

CIFF 2015 Review: Censored Voices

Movie Review by Everyday Activist X CalgaryMovies.com

My father was a rebel in the 1971 Battle for Independence between what is now known as Bangladesh and Pakistan. Like many people who have been through wars and other bloody altercations, he never talked about his experiences to us. My mom had heard some stories and passed them on. At one during the war my grandmother thought my dad was dead because someone brought home his watch. What actually happened was he was being pursued and to hide he switched clothes with a dead body. Some of those bodies were his friends and others that he knew. From this context I have utmost respect, as well as admiration, for the Israeli soldiers who spoke about their own freedom fight a few years earlier in 1967, The Six Day War. Most of these interviews were censored and are only now available to the public via the documentary, Censored Voices.

Director Mor Loushy has some creative juxtapositions of the young soldiers' voices on tape with the older present selves listening to what had been recorded several decades earlier. Many of them held the same opinions now as they did then then about the fairness of displacing innocent people. Some of them compared it to the Holocaust that their own families had suffered a couple decades prior. The voices narrated the archival images from that time; including footage from American journalists. I don't know much about the beginning of the Israeli/Palestinian conflict, but after watching this film with its artistic merit coupled with the raw emotion and first hand experience of these men, gives the audience a good idea of how we ended up with the present issues in the Middle East.

What originated as men fighting for their right to survive as a community quickly turned into people losing their humanity and their friends to war. Others tried to console them with thoughts of the rightful return of the Holy Land; however, surprisingly, the voices on the tape couldn't care less about a wall; instead they lamented their actions of humiliating people and the deaths of friends. As young men they foretold much of the violence that we see today between the Arabs and Israelis. While they didn't voice this opinion, after watching the documentary one got the feeling that they knew they were pawns in a bigger political game rather than fighting for their existence.

Censored Voices will screen at Eau Claire Market Cinemas both on Sunday September 27th, 2015 at 6:45 PM and Sunday October 4th, 2015 at 11 AM. Check the Movie Nights Meetup group if you want to watch with others. I hope lots of people come out to see the Winner of Best Documentary at the Subversive Film Festival in Croatia. It's a bit surreal to see how the past affects future, while at the same time provides context for the current Middle East conflict.

Calgary Local Scene Event Listing: Calgary International Film Festival 2015 >
CalgaryMovies.com's CIFF 2015 Coverage >