Customer Reviews

Afghan Stories

5 star:		(3)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

This documentary film seeks to open up a side to Afghanistan previously unseen by Western viewers. It's a personal film, the story of the director and an Afghan friend traveling around the country, seeing if they could unearth some sign of life in places destroyed by over twenty years of war. That alone was a revelation. Before seeing Afghan stories, it was easy to think of the nation as a terrorist state, but this films dips far enough into the past to unravel private histories, allowing us to get to know a handful of Afghans. Maybe they are, maybe they aren't symbolic of the rest of their people, but an obvious humanity is on display, as well as the danger and confusion of a people simultaneously suspicious and welcoming of the American bombardment that continues throughout the filming of this documentary. I actually saw this on the Sundance Channel, so I can't vouch for any extras in the DVD, but there's more to be learned here than in a hundred hours of network news.

This movie is a vivid, moving documentary about Afghans living in and out of Afghanistan in the period shortly following September 11th. The filmmakers visit people in the US, Canada, Tajikistan, and Afghanistan to get a picture of what life is like for Afghans with a variety of perspectives to share. I showed it in my high school humanities class paired with the novel Kite Runner and the students loved it; even they were no match for an emotional scene with a small child singing about wanting to return to Kabul. I recommend this for educators as well as anyone looking to see the more personal side of war-torn Afghanistan.

This is a wonderful documentary. I highly encourage educators to use this film. Out of a list of documentaries on Afghanistan that I teach in my undergraduate course, my students always list this as the most influential film for them. It is both informative, humorous and very human. It presents such a wide variety of Afghans from the diaspora and in Afghanistan that it deconstructs any one image or stereotype of Afghans. Walied Osman, the Afghan American lead, certainly makes the navigation through these two seemingly different worlds easier. My students, New Yorkers, have connected with him and it is his guidance through Afghanistan that touches them deeply.

I was hoping for more than it was. It basically had three afghan stories and only one was in Afghanistan. I was hoping for a much more varied look at life inside Afghanistan during the war.

I was interested in what the video showed about Afghanistan and its people. It clarified for me some things I was not sure about. It made me realize the great need there is to help these people.

This is a bad way to ask for money for tha afghan people. You feel sorry during the whole movie. At the end, they ask for donations. Sorry I ever purchased.