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The months leading up to the
religious New Year of 1380 in Afghanistan were the months
after the September 11, 2001 attacks and the U.S. retaliation
against the Taliban regime. For ordinary Afghans, the
time between President Bush's declaration of war and
the fall of Kabul brought yet another passage of death
and suffering in a country alternately ravaged and abandoned
by global political forces.
In a riveting follow-up to their internationally acclaimed
documentary, "Jung (War) In the Land of the Mujaheddin,"
which looked at life under the Taliban pre-September
11, the Italian filmmaking team of Alberto Vendemmiati,
Fabrizio Lazzaretti, and Giuseppe Petitto have produced
a remarkable journal of life under the bombs after September
11 in "Afghanistan Year 1380."
"Afghanistan Year 1380" has its American television
premiere Monday, September 9, 10 p.m. ET, in a special
edition of public television's P.O.V. series (check
for rebroadcasts). The film airs as part of PBS's
week-long commemoration of the September 11 attacks.
One of three specials concluding P.O.V.'s 15th anniversary
season as television's first and longest-running showcase
of independent, non-fiction films, "Afghanistan
Year 1380" will be followed by "Two Towns
of Jasper," which airs Wednesday, January 22, 2003
at 9 p.m. ET (check
for rebroadcasts), and the 2003 Special "Brother
Outsider: The Life of Bayard Rustin."
In the wake of the attacks on the World Trade Center
and the Pentagon, the filmmakers felt a special responsibility
to use the trust and knowledge they had gained in making
"Jung (War)" to report once again on conditions
inside Afghanistan. With unsparing detail, the plight
of ordinary Afghans is seen through the prism of the
independent medical relief group, Emergency. Surgeon
Gino Strada and medical coordinator Kate Rowlands, and
their staff of local and international volunteers, struggle
through civil war, air raids, and lawlessness to treat
civilian victims and prisoners-of-war.
As war with the U.S. loomed, Emergency was running a
hospital for civilians on the front lines between the
Northern Alliance and the Taliban, and providing medical
care to prisoners of the Taliban — a service the
group would later provide to Taliban prisoners of the
Alliance. Emergency was also hoping to re-open its surgical
center in Kabul. Designed to treat war victims in need
of trauma treatment and reconstructive surgery, the
110-bed hospital had been shut down by the Taliban only
a month after its opening in April 2001. Even as the
city comes under attack in October 2001, Strada and
Rowlands make a perilous journey across the front lines
in an effort to get the trauma center operating.
Filmed with the cinematic power of a Hollywood drama
— but shorn of the formulas that make tragedy more
bearable — "Afghanistan Year 1380" shows
close-up the human toll among civilians of current and
past wars. Strada and Rowlands and staff find themselves
treating victims of old Soviet mines as readily as casualties
of current U.S bombing. The wounds are horrific, whole
families are wiped out. Ordinary people curse both sides,
pray to God, and hope for a peaceful future. As always,
it is the children who provide the most searing spectacle
of wanton destruction in a country where war has been
a constant for generations.
Emergency is a non-profit, humanitarian organization
dedicated to providing assistance to civilian victims
of war — both the wounded and those who suffer
war's consequences of hunger and lack of medical care.
A private, independent, and neutral humanitarian organization,
Emergency uses low-cost technology and materials to
establish surgical/rehabilitation centers inside conflict
zones, and trains staffs of local people to meet civilian
medical needs. Since its inception in 1994, the group
has treated over 285,000 victims of war free of charge
on a strictly neutral and egalitarian basis.
"Afghanistan Year 1380" is an extraordinary
record of war and humanitarian activism. It is an apt
reminder that modern war is most brutal for the young
and helpless.
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Credits
Directed by: Alberto Vendemmiati and Fabrizio Lazzaretti
Produced by: Giuseppe Petitto
About the Filmmakers
Alberto Vendemmiati
Alberto Vendemmiati, after getting a degree in the Theatre
School of Bologna (Italy), worked as an actor for some
years. In 1993 he received his D.A.M.S. degree in Film
and Literature at the University of Bologna, and in
1994 graduated Director at the National Film School
in Rome. He's realized several short films, presented
at International film festivals, focusing on the relationship
between fiction and documentary. In 1994 to 1996 he
produces and served as director on the feature film
"Cadabra" (a Quadra Image release), inspired
from the poetic and personality of Italian screenwriter
and director Cesare Zavattini. In 1998 he co-produced
and served as co-director, and sound engineer on "Crucifige
(Let's Crucify)" and "Le Voci Fuori (Voices
Off)" (Karousel Films releases), focusing on themes
related to mental diseases. Vendemmiati has co-produced,
co-directed, and served as cameraman and sound engineer
on the critically acclaimed "Jung (War) in the Land
of Mujaheddin," shot in Afghanistan in 1999 and
2000. "Afghanistan Year 1380" is a follow-up
of that experience in the wake of September 11th.
Fabrizio Lazzaretti
Fabrizio Lazzaretti is the son of a renowned Filmmaker
of the Italian Public Television who spent his career
covering military conflicts, and producing other socio-political
and cultural documentaries. Lazzaretti began his own
filmmaking career alongside his father as an assistant
and second camera. In 1985, he began a series of freelance
projects, working first at RAI London and then with
the New York RAI corporation. In the mid-90s he turned
his full attention to independent documentary production
serving as a producer, director, cinematographer and
cameraman on several films including "Drug Stories,"
about the heroin traffic of the Golden Triangle area,
and "Victory at all Costs," about the after-affects
of the war in Vietnam. In 1998 he co-produced, and served
as co-director and cameraman, on "Crucifige (Let's Crucify),"
and "Le Voci Fuori (Voices Off)," focusing on themes
related to mental diseases. In 1999-2000 Lazzaretti
co-produced, co-directed, and served as cameraman on
"Jung (War) in the Land of the Mujaheddin".
In 1999-2000 he was the director of "Report", an investigative
journalism series airing on the Italian public channel
RAI 3. In 2001 he co-produced and served as director
and cameraman on "Socialmente Pericolosi (A Danger
to Society)," surveying conditions in a criminal
mental hospital near Naples, where patients are still
considered sub-human and subjected to outmoded, sometimes
brutal therapies. In 2001 he served as co-director,
and cameraman on "Afghanistan Year 1380." He
is currently co-producing, directing and serving as
a cameraman on "A Fight for Justice "(working
title), a film that tracks the legal battle resulting
from the death of a young Italian poet in Colombia.
Giuseppe Petitto
A bold filmmaker as well as a skilled lawyer, Giuseppe
Petitto combines these seemingly disparate career interests
as Managing Director of Karousel Films, a cooperative
non-profit organization that provides technical support
and production expertise to independent filmmakers.
The director of several short films, both documentary
and fictional, Petitto has served as a producer, director
and editor on several Karousel productions including
"Sanpeet (Poison)," a film about seven year-old
Sanpeet Petnonnoi and other boys like him who risk their
lives as contestants in unregulated, high stakes kickboxing
matches as they struggle to keep their families above
the poverty line. In 1998 he co-produced, and served
as editor on "Crucifige (Let's Crucify)," and
"Le Voci Fuori (Voices off)." In 2001 he co-produced
and served as editor on "Socialmente Pericolosi
(A Danger to Society)," (a Karousel films release).
Petitto also worked on "Jung (War) in the Land of
the Mujaheddin" as line producer, field editor,
and editor. He is a graduate of the EAVE (European Audiovisual
Entrepreneurs), Europe's premier advanced training program
for audiovisual production, and is also a Graduate Director
of the National Film School in Rome. Petitto is currently
directing "Rooms Are Never Finished", a film
depicting Kashmiri people's grief, struggle, and expectations
in these days of escalating violence amidst the mounting
political tension of an impending election, as seen
through the magnifying lens of a great Kashmiri-American
poet.
Check out an interview
with producer Giuseppe Petitto and a production
journal detailing the making of "Afghanistan
Year 1380."
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