Review of War Witch (2012) by Craig Dylan W — 18 Feb 2013

Extremely disturbing n emotional, but poetic story of a girl, who forcefully becomes a victim of war in Africa.

The most noteworthy about this film is how dir. Nguyen demonstrates "less is more." So much discipline in story telling. He knows exactly when to push the right note to give depth to character. In the opening, he begins with a girl, who explains that she became a soldier forcefully by the rebel, telling her unborn child, "I dont know if God will give the strength to love you." Beautiful sentence that has haunting msg underneath; start to imagine wut this could've mean to a 12 yr old girl who became a soldier.

Instead of showing graphic violence, the dir Nguyen provokes our imagination thru the images n the narration. Another example, which I luv to do in my screenplay, is how he tell us the story of the uncle, and massacre of his family. Don't tell the whole backstory, give a slight piece of it, n show the aftermath.

Even though its the story of a girl, the camera observes her journey, rather than being too subjective. Wut is emotionally lacking is feel with her narration.

Some mite argue, the third act lacks drama, but take closer look, it starts with haunting look at the aftermath, n has such powerful, but subtle conclusion.

Anyway, there r so much I could learn from this film. I probably go back many times to learn more. Btw I strongly believe Rachel Mwanza should been nominated...