Darfur Diaries: Message from Home
by Catherine Lee

      The world is full of horrible things. This isn’t news. When the headlines aren’t stuffed with psycho shooters, crude and self-serving radio loudmouths or the sad and strange life and death of a talentless media-manufactured celebrity, there are always wars to fill the papers with a parade of all that is worst about human beings. Too rarely do we read or see something that helps make sense of some spot of horror on the planet. It is oh so tempting to just keep your head down and not even try to understand.

      I approached seeing Darfur Diaries: Message from Home with some trepidation. That desire to just ignore what’s happening has a bit of a hold on me lately, and I worried that a film about the under-reported genocide in the Darfur region of Sudan would leave me filled with anger, tears, frustration and hopelessness. But this concise, moving and highly instructive portrait of the tragedy unfolding in Darfur had just the opposite effect. We can understand this situation, and we can help fix it.

      Darfur Diaries: Message from Home begins with a sequence of animation. Children’s drawings of what happens when a village in Darfur is bombed come to life. Watching these images left me paralyzed in my seat. The contrast between the drawings by children, which are charming in their simplicity, should depict the simple and joyous events of childhood. Instead, they show the actions of war: planes dropping bombs; tanks rolling through villages; and people of all ages running away.

      I froze, thinking, “If this movie shows me live images of this happening, I will have to run out of the theater.” Instead, after the opening credits we are given very basic and instructive facts about what is happening in Darfur. These facts are supported by the accounts of refugees who have fled their homes to escape the violence. In a film lasting only an hour, the anatomy of this genocide is explained.

      These witness accounts are heartbreaking, and the events described are horrifying. The grace, dignity and strength of the speakers is what keeps the film from being unbearable. The filmmakers do not exploit those they interview by asking for the details of the murder and rape that is happening. The witnesses to these atrocities speak of what has happened with reserve. They hope to protect those still living while exposing the crimes for the world to understand.

      The conflicts in Iraq and the region are often portrayed as intractable conflicts that go back as far as 10 centuries. This is an easy way out for us. The dominance and partitioning of the region by Western powers over the more recent history of the region is often overlooked, giving an easy out for those who would throw up their hands and say, “This is not our problem.”

      The most impressive accomplishment of Darfur Diaries: Message from Home is that it explains, through the voices of the citizens of Sudan, exactly how this tragedy has been fueled. The movie explains the past relationships and tensions between Arab and African peoples in the region. It does not shy away from the racist elements of this conflict, but it does locate and ground them as manageable. The movie gives a voice to people who tell us how Arab and African Muslims shared the land and the culture traditionally.

      Until the current government began funding the Janjaweed militias, people were able to work out differences. The voices of Darfur Diaries: Message from Home make it clear that the policies and activities of the current government are responsible for the killings. The film walks us through destroyed villages with those who survived, where the debris of bombs and weapons prove that the government lies when it says these are just local conflicts that it does not support.

      Darfur Diaries: Message from Home doesn’t dictate a solution. It dissects the problem. It doesn’t point fingers at the United Nations or the United States. It doesn’t mention the one thing that lets the international community look the other way when confronted with the culpability of the Sudanese government. Can you guess what the problem is? Oil.

      But this is not a weakness of the film. It is one of its strengths. The film says, "Here is the tragedy." It is up to us to ask “What can we do?” Filmmakers Aisha Bain, Jen Marlowe and Adam Shapiro could have gone a different direction. Their backgrounds are in activism, and film is their medium of choice for this cause. But after seeing Darfur Diaries: Message from Home you want to do something to help with a solution because you see that it is possible.

      Sunday, April 29, 2007 is a day of global awareness for the genocide in Darfur. In our part of the world several local organizations are working together to raise awareness and funds to help. Events include screenings of Darfur Diaries: Message from Home on April 26 and April 29. For more information about the film and the screenings go to www.darfurdiaries.org.

 Fort Wayne is home to the Darfur Peace and Development Organization, a nationally and internationally based organization and leader in helping the people of Darfur. For more information about the situation in Darfur, go to their excellent website at www.dpdao.org.

      The Darfur Peace and Development Organization is working to fund the Solar Cooking Project, just one of their initiatives. Local efforts will help support this project, which will provide inexpensive solar cookers to Darfurians living in refugee camps. Solar cookers will reduce deforestation, a powerful negative environmental force in the region. Solar cookers also reduce violence because refugees are vulnerable to attack and rape when they have to go out to gather firewood. If people can use a solar cooker, their time and energy can be devoted to other pressing needs and issues. For more information on the solar cooker project go to www.darfurpeace.org.

      Larger political solutions are needed to stop the violence against the people of Darfur, but coming soon to a theater near you is the opportunity to understand a problem half a world a way and make a contribution to a locally based entrepreneurial enterprise to promote peace and safety. Don’t shy away. Get involved. Learn how to help.

Catherine Lee is the executive director of Fort Wayne Cinema Center, the only independently operated movie theater in Fort Wayne, specializing in independent, foreign, documentary, specialty and classic films.

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