Alefbay-e Afghan

Plot

Following worldwide critical acclaim for his 2001 drama Kandahar, Mohsen Makhmalbaf returns to the subject of Afghanistan for a documentary, Afghan Alphabet. The film explores the lot of Afghan children who live as refugees just inside the Iranian border. While children are shown playing or studying on camera, a narrator explains their situation. War, famine, and drought have left many of these children with no education. Even before the Taliban regime, a large majority of Afghans, boys and girls, did not have access to education. But an effort is being made in the refugee camps to provide schooling. As we see the boys engaged in religious study, the filmmaker questions them about the nature of God. They answer, nervously, as they think they are supposed to. Children who do not have proper identification are not allowed to attend classes, so they sit outside the tiny schoolhouse and listen. In the last part of the film, a girls' class is shown. The teacher, a woman, tries to get one girl, Samira, to remove her burqa and wash her face as part of a classroom demonstration. When the girl refuses, citing religious reasons, the teacher tells her that its pointless for her to be in the class, because she cannot participate with the burqa covering her entire face, including her eyes. Samira tearfully leaves the classroom. A classmate follows her out and tries to persuade her to return and participate, but Samira explains that her late father was a mullah, and it would desecrate his memory to show her face to the class. A song plays on the film's soundtrack with the lyrics "If only Afghan girls were born somewhere else." The film was made to benefit the Afgan Children Education Movement. It was shown as part of the 2002 Tribeca Film Festival. ~ Josh Ralske, Rovi

Review

Afghan Alphabet is a humane and heartbreaking look at the education (or lack thereof) of Afghan children who live in refugee camps within Iran. Renowned filmmaker Mohsen Makhmalbaf succeeds fully in personalizing the plight of Afghan children, particularly girls, whom war, drought, and famine have left without an education. The children repeatedly demonstrate their determination to learn. Interviewed by the filmmakers, they express a touching enthusiasm for schooling. Later in the film, young boys undergoing religious training are interviewed -- confronted, really -- by the director, who's not willing to accept their rote answers as he questions them about their faith. Their palpable discomfort as he prods them on spiritual matters serves as a cunning critique of religious indoctrination. The boys are enthusiastic, mugging for the camera, sometimes grinning, shouting their answers, but the filmmaker can't quite provoke them to think for themselves. The last segment of the film, involving the reluctance of one young girl student to remove her burqa in order to participate in a class, furthers Makhmalbaf's point. The girl's fears are completely irrational, as the Taliban no longer exists in her life, but at the same time, the power of what she's struggling against, the subservient role she's been prepared for, is undeniable. It's doubly tragic to realize that had the girl been raised under different circumstances, her determination would serve her well. Makhmalbaf has often blurred the line between fiction and reality in his films, and while Afghan Alphabet begins as a straightforward documentary, it concludes on such an amazingly dramatic note that one can't help but suspect that the filmmaker had a hand in its outcome. Regardless, this doesn't detract from the film's worthiness. It's more of a philosophical question. The film's power and its canniness in making its points is undeniable. ~ Josh Ralske, Rovi

Credit

Samira Makhmalbaf - First Assistant Director, Hana Makhmalbaf - First Assistant Director, Mohsen Makhmalbaf - Director, Mohsen Makhmalbaf - Editor, Mohsen Makhmalbaf - Cinematographer, Mojtaba Mirtahmasb - Sound/Sound Designer, Mohsen Makhmalbaf - Screenwriter

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