Product Details

• Actors: Michel Piccoli, Pavol Zatko
• Directors: Philippe Diaz
• Format: Color, DVD, NTSC
• Language: English
• Region: All Regions
• Aspect Ratio: 1.33:1
• Number of discs: 1
• Rated: Unrated
• Studio: Cinema Libre
• DVD Release Date: March 6, 2007
• Run Time: 87 minutes
• Average Customer Review: 3.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (4 customer reviews)
• ASIN: B000MX7UXK
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #134,583 in Movies & TV (See Top 100 in Movies & TV)

Editorial Reviews

The rebels who started the civil war in Sierra Leone 15 years ago wanted only one thing: to reclaim the richness of the country from foreign corporations in order to end the exploitation of its people. In response the international community decided to wage a war on this country with bombs executions torture rigged elections and manipulation of the international media. This created one of the worst humanitarian disasters of the 20th century.System Requirements:Run Time: 87 minutesFormat: DVD MOVIE Genre: DOCUMENTARIES/MISC. UPC: 881394102125 Manufacturer No: CLS1021

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

6 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars shocking on many levels, September 11, 2009

By 

R. B. Penglase (Chicago, IL, USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: The Empire in Africa (DVD)

I really wish that there existed a decent documentary about the horrible civil war in Sierra Leone. This one, though, is disturbing on many levels. First, the film-makers criticize the international media for focusing on amputees. Yet over and over again the film traffics in this same type of pornography of violence, for no apparent reason that serves the narrative other than to shock the viewer and promote the underlying impression (which they surely didn't intend) of "African savagery." Second, while I'm no expert on Sierra Leone, the film's handling of the conflict seems far from even-handed. I'm willing to agree that attrocities by the RUF were given far more attention than attrocities by ECOMOG. But this film comes very, very, close to saying that the RUF was unfairly scapegoated. This slides dangerously close to an appology for the horrible acts that the RUF committed. The overall message here is plain and important: it was the civilians in Sierra Leone who suffered while the international community ignored the conflict or manipulated it for its own gain, and that this is part of a larger colonial and neo-colonial pattern of denying Africans autonomous control over their own societies. But surely this point could have been made more intelligently and with more nuanced analysis.

1.0 out of 5 stars Pro-RUF Garbage, December 11, 2011

By 

Brian Carnell (Kalamazoo, MI) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: The Empire in Africa (DVD)

This is basically one long, inaccurate apologia for the Revolutionary United Front -- a group that abducted children to fight as child soldiers and whose surviving leaders were convicted of war crimes in 2007. The RUF committed widespread atrocities, including the amputation of limbs of tens of thousands of civilians. This film, however, bizarrely focuses on the United Nations, UK, and Nigeria -- all of whom intervened at different stages to stop the atrocities -- as the main aggressors in Sierra Leone.

2 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars horrendous tragedies, March 11, 2010

By 

nzinga "princess" (mississippi) - See all my reviews

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: The Empire in Africa (DVD)

This is a 'must-see' for all individuals of good conscience to try to educate and reform certain societies where violence is rampant. Africa is important because it is the birthplace of humanity therefore qualifying for a respectable look at what can be done to return it to its original greatness.