New Darfur Film Knows No Shame

The man "widely considered to be the worst working director today" + Darfur = Disaster.

You don't even need to see the full film to tell -- here's all you need to know: White journalists in a gun battle with the Janjaweed.

Seriously.

If the trailer is any indication, Uwe Boll's new film Darfur is the worst kind of white-man's-burden, heart-of-darkness trash known to cinema -- Eurocentric Africa filmmaking at its most condescending. Starring Billy Zane.

The film repeats a theme commonly seen in movies about African wars: White people in search of adventure stumble into a land of lawlessness and are touched and distraught by the devastation they find. But by bringing his rugged characters into direct confrontation with villainous Janjaweed militia, Boll is truly in a class of his own.

I've often found that most people are unwilling to criticize a movie about genocide, be it documentary or feature film. I was given a funny look when I walked out of Invisibles and said, "That's the most boring movie I've ever seen." The movies are always "moving" and "heartbreaking" because of the gravity of the subject matter, as if basic standards for storytelling (not to mention respect, in Boll's case) are thrown out the window every time someone decides to make a film about human suffering.

Boll takes this unfounded freedom too far. The trailer is embedded past the jump -- judge for yourself.

[Photo of Uwe Boll from Wikimedia Commons.]