Music From A War Zone
In Northern Uganda, where 30,000 children have been abducted to serve in the rebel army, the government has built camps for remaining families and parentless children where they can be safe. Of these, the Acholi tribe, for whom music and dancing are integral to their daily lives, try to live as best they can, having been forced from their beautiful homelands. The Oscar-nominated War/Dance focuses on one such camp, Patongo, where the children have vowed to enter the annual Ugandan music and dance competition, inspired by their camp teachers.
We meet some of these ‘children’ face-to-face as they stare into the camera, some only giving their names, some telling their stories, tears streaming down their cheeks. Most of these we meet, personally, are 13 or 14 years-old. Some have seen their parents killed right in front of them, beheaded or cut to pieces. Is ‘happiness’ possible for such victims? Yes, they say, when they sing or dance or play instruments (drums, flutes, and wooden xylophones are traditional for the Acholi), sometimes writing original material, always playing traditional music. All vow they will enter the competition in the capitol city (but will have to be transported for two-days through dangerous rebel-infested territory).
War/Dance does not use traditional voice-over narration: the kids tell their own unscripted stories and commentary in English. (Printed text appears occasionally at the bottom of the frame to provide additional information.) Parentless children taken in by other families are often forced to work extremely hard, and some will not be allowed to make the trip to the music competition. Other, luckier kids, some escaped from the rebel army where they were forced to kill, rehearse with joyful zeal. ‘When we sing and dance,’ one says, ‘all the bad dreams go away.’
As you might guess, the l05-minute doc is structured to climax during the music competition, where we seen other children, some from camps like Patongo, some with more resources. (The United Nations provides food for all such children.) In their make-shift but ingenious costumes our Patongos compete in several categories: traditional dance/music; instrumental music; original song and dances; and vie for an overall grand prize. A question is this: will all that rehearsal-effort undergone in a sweltering, dusty one-room schoolhouse somehow pay off? Perhaps this story is not telling too much to say that children–like Rose, Dominic and Nancy, whom we have met–do win prizes at the Kampala National Festival.
The film opens and closes with the same (unscripted) quotation from these musicians and dancers: ‘It is difficult to believe our story, but if we don’t tell you, you won’t know.’
War/Dance, a Sundance Film Fest winner, plays at the Doris Duke Theatre, 900 S. S. Beretania St., Sat., 3/8, Sun 3/9, Tue 3/11-Thu., 3/13, 1 & 7:30pm; Fri 3/14, 1pm, 532-8768
