War is real baby

by Duc Nguyen

Watch the film here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MGVc8lzMKrA

The amount of blood that migrated to my brain, thanks to the intellectual stimulation spurred by the UC Berkeley academic training, got a little detour on Saturday. It returned to my heart due to the haunting and stark film by Fabrizio Lazzaretti, Giuseppe Petitto and Alberto Vendemmiati about the devastation war imposed on human in Afghanistan.

Jung: In The Land of The Mujaheddin left me aghast in its explicit, gruesome depiction of war. The film followed the mission of an Italian doctor, and his crew to set up hospitals in Afghanistan mending the wounded. With its nonrestrictive approach, the camera was right there at the front line, the surgery table, the hospital floor… It followed the tank tracks, blood marks and bullet trails to allow the audience a first-hand account of war, allowing what seems to be an understatement considering the magnification of scenes that aren’t often shown in this civilized society of ours. Due to the rustle and murmuring of the audience during the graphic flesh-exposing scenes, I suspected these flickering images of what war could be like and those who are caught in it were too much to take by some members of the audience.

What seems to amaze me about this film is its proximity to Ground Zero (and I don’t mean the one in NYC)…