Terror's Advocate (Barbet Schroeder, 2007)

You probably haven't heard of Jacques Verges, but you almost definitely have heard of some of the people he's defended in court: Djamila Bouhired, Algerian nationalist bomber; Klaus Barbie, Nazi "Butcher of Lyon"; Magdalena Kopp, Baader-Meinhoff gang member; and Slobodan Molosevic, former president of Serbia and Yugoslavia. Verges earned the titular nickname defending all these people, though not because of some idealistic notion that everyone needs defending. In fact, director/narrator Barbet Schroeder (whom I really admire) doesn't force the question, and instead, Verges gives a few vague answers, mostly tied to French atrocities in the Algerian war. Schroeder's ridiculously passive approach to this film is really its downfall, although it does also lead to some intriguing moments. Verges gets involved as a French law student in communist action, then is recruited to defend Bouhired, among others, from killing French citizens in a series of bombings. He becomes very sympathetic to the cause, and outrageous in the courtroom. The first half or so of the film is dedicated to the Algerian cause, and we see first-hand the events from Battle of Algiers. Verges also has a hero complex, it seems, as he marries (and eventually deserts) Bouhired, and does the same later in his life with Kopp. Patronizing heroism aside, Verges is deeply passionate about his beliefs, and in present-day interviews, still comes off as so. But once we get past about 1970 chronologically, Verges all but refuses to talk about anything in his life. He disappeared from 1970-1978, but won't say where he was or what he was doing, even after 30 years. Some suggest he was with Pol Pot and the Khmer Rouge in Cambodia, and Verges admits being friends with Pol Pot, but, again, Schroeder never calls him on this. It would have been fascinating to see this confident, articulate man defend what we now know was a brutal regime. Neither will he really say why he defended Barbie (except to remind the court, in the 80s, about French atrocities in Algeria), and when we find out he defended certain people who were directly against his beliefs (an African warlord, notorious terrorist Carlos the Jackal), still no explanation. Verges just sits behind a huge desk, smug after all these years. He actually infuriate me for the most part. Schroeder really lets Verges off the hook in this film, refusing to ever make him face his mistakes. Perhaps Verges just refused to have these things discussed, but it really takes away from what could have been an amazingly revealing documentary. One more minor problem I had: although the political situations around the people Verges defended were complicated and intricately interwoven (one of the most interesting things about the film is how every "terrorist" network in the world is interconnected, especially the Nazi-Palestinian connection, which I never considered and makes me uncomfortable in my beliefs), there was far too much backstory in this film for it to have any flow whatsoever. This is a great disappointment from the great Schroeder, even more so considering what this film could have been. 6/10

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More (Barbet Schroder, 1969)

More, Barbet Schroder's directorial debut, is the kind of film that screams out to be remade, and one that I would definitely do were I a filmmakeer (oh, one day!). It is the story of the sixties fading into the seventies, psychedelics into hard drugs, innocence into jaded hipness, complete with an original Pink Floyd score. It is the story of Stefan, a naive German student, hitchhiking through Europe, who meets Estelle, a New York art student who takes him to Ibiza. They smoke a lot of pot, and, eventually, Estelle's heroin habit resurfaces, and they both become addicts in this idyllic fantasyland. Stefan arrives in Paris, where he hitches a ride with Charlie, with whom he becomes fast friends. Charlie takes Stefan to a party, where he meets Estelle. Charlie tries to warn him against Estelle, saying that she has ruined men before, and that Stefan would be wise to stay away from her, but he doesn't listen and falls for her immediately. They meet up a few days later, in a ridiculous scene where Stefan smokes pot for the first time, and decide to go to Ibiza together, being young, beautiful people with nothing better to do. When there, they stay for a while with Dr. Wolf, a friend of Estelle's father who is also probably her lover (it's left ambiguous in the film), but decide to run away to the countryside when Stefan gets jealous of Wolf. In the process, Estelle steals 200 doses of heroin from Wolf, along with some money, and Wolf pursues and eventually finds them. By that time, they are both heroin addicts, living this spaced out life in paradise, and my favorite scene in the film is when Stefan (formerly a righteous anti-drug person, now a heroin addict) and Estelle attack a windmill, a la Don Quixote. It's a beautiful, quasi-romantic version of drug abuse, but, like in Neil Armfield's Candy (that owes a debt to More), things go terribly wrong, as their relationship sours and Estelle eventually does lead to Stefan's downfall, as Charlie predicted. The dialogue is, at times embarrassingly, typical of the time, with the philosophies and wonders of drugs espoused by these young people, who came of age in the time of the hippies, but are looking for something more. It is an ageless tale, one that resonates with me even now; looking for a better life through illegal substances, and thinking you can change the world with them. This is a film that should be more widely seen, despite some definite ties to the time, as the story is timeless, and the characters believably tragic. It's a film I would remake, most definitely. 7/10 RIYL: Rohmer's Six Moral Tales (of which Schroeder was a producer)

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General Idi Amin Dada (Barbet Schroeder, 1974)

French filmmaker Barbet Schroeder was given unprecedented access to Ugandan dictator Idi Amin in 1974, in order to make a documentary about him. In fact, the documentary turned into a self-portrait, so much so that Schroeder put the subtitle "Autoportrait" on the film. Even after editing "acceptable" to Amin, he found out that the European cut showed him in a less-than-flattering light, and took the French citizens in Uganda hostage until Schroeder agreed to change the film to Amin's liking. All this background made for a powerful film of a brutal dictator at the time, but has lost a bit of its power over the years. As Roger Ebert pointed out in his review, this is not a very good documentary, because of Amin's obsessive supervision. Many of the events in the film, such as a whole village coming out to greet Amin as he arrives in a helicopter, were staged for the film (Schroeder lets us know in the voice-over). Amin is the star of the picture, and almost every scene is just him talking to the camera, or to a group of his officials. He offers his views on Israel and Palestine, but is less forthcoming when asked about his comments about Hitler. Keeping in mind that Amin was a dictator who, in seven years, may have killed up to half a million Ugandan citizens, this is a frightening documentary. But there is another side to this documentary, and that is the scary fact that Amin is, well, charming. I found myself laughing at his jokes, such as when he jokes that the Ugandan navy, while in a land-locked country, is the pride of Lake Victoria. He plays the accordian, and in fact, produced the score for the movie. He dances with the citizens at dances in his honor. He is shown in a swimming contest, and, in my favorite scene, in a boat on the Nile, waving and talking about the crocodiles, hippos, and elephants abundant in the water. He compares himself to the crocodile, while is eerily correct. One of the greatest strengths of Schroeder's picture is showing that even though the audience knows all of Amin's evil-doings, he is charming, and we are again reminded that even the greatest evil can have a very appealing face on it. Again, it's lost most of its power thirty years later, when Idi Amin is now a footnote in world history, but this film is an interesting portrait of an utterly interesting man, as staged as it might be. 6/10 RIYL: Documentaries, world politics

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