Coming to theatres tomorrow, Friday, September 27: THE NETWORK
Eva Orner’s behind-the-scenes look at Afghanistan’s first independent television network made its debut at SXSW this year. It has also screened at Sheffield, Antenna, Festival do Rio, and Bermuda, among other events.
Marking Orner’s directorial debut, the producer of the Academy Award winning TAXI TO THE DARK SIDE returns to Afghanistan to witness the rebirth of culture in a society in which it brutally had been oppressed under Taliban rule. Her focus is the Mohseni family, expatriates who saw the need to bring information and entertainment to their homeland. Despite having no previous experience in broadcasting, they successfully launched a radio station, and followed up with Tolo TV, which quickly became the nation’s most popular channel. Recruiting Westerners in key creative and managerial roles, Tolo lays the groundwork to mentor and train the first modern generation of Afghan media professionals – a vital step, noted here, as coalition forces prepare to withdraw from the country. While showing the infectious pleasures of young Afghans learning the ropes, and telling their country’s own stories in diverting soap operas and the like, Orner’s film also offers an intriguing look at the promise of television to affect social change in a still-volatile region, as she highlights US government funded dramas that are intended to foster public confidence in the Afghan police and security forces, or programs that are incrementally combatting restrictive attitudes to women and their rights.
what (not) to doc 