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WEEKEND MAG Post-Gazette film critic Barry Paris can be reached at [email protected].
The birth of a notion at CMU is called "Faces of Democracy," the highly ambitious Carnegie Mellon International Film Festival debuting this week and continuing through Dec. 10.
It's an important new addition to the city's motion-picture smorgasbord: the Pittsburgh premiere of a dozen award-winning features and documentaries, plus 10 short student films, in as many languages from around the world, under the topical umbrella of democracy and its contemporary global dynamics.
You couldn't ask for a more diverse, thought-provoking look at cultures and societies in transition, or of cinematic styles, in screenings (at CMU, SouthSide Works and Regent Square Theater) intended to foster debate of the filmmakers' issues. Several of the directors will be in attendance to present their pictures and lead discussions.
Among the highlights of Week One (all screenings at Carnegie Mellon University's McConomy Auditorium):
* Tonight at 5 p.m.: "My Country My Country" (USA, 2006), 90 min., in Kurdish, English and Arabic, with an introduction by director Laura Poitras.
The documentary highlighting the ethnic and religious issues surrounding the 2005 Iraq elections focuses on the phenomenal Dr. Riyadh, a Baghdad candidate seeking the opinions of his family, friends and countrymen during an election clouded by violence and the U.S. occupation.
Among the many recent Iraq documentaries ("Occupation: Dreamland," "Iraq for Sale," "Iraq in Fragments," etc.) this is one of the most compelling, showing what the war has really been like for Iraqis. Poitras gives us an inside look at the electoral process there. She worked alone for eight months with Dr. Riyadh, a sophisticated physician and family man who despises the American occupation and believes Islam offers more justice than any secular system -- yet also believes in democracy. Her film shows how inevitably alien the American and Iraqi world views are to each other.
* Tonight at 7:15 p.m.: "Avenge But One of My Two Eyes" (Israel/ France, 2005), 100 min., followed by a live-video Q&A conference with director Avi Mograbi in Israel.
Sometimes called the "Israeli...
