White Hotel March 1, 2000 Tamar Culberson: The White Hotel, a documentary about AIDS in the African nation of Eritrea, becomes caught up in its surroundings and draws the viewer into an unforgettable experience. While waiting to talk to government officials to start the project, the filmmakers turn the camera on themselves and the country around them. The result is a combination of powerful images and imaginative storytelling. Drawn to Eritrea by a friend working on an international study of AIDS, they discover a country emerging from a 20-year civil war giddy with freedom and hope for the future. Interviewing government officials, prostitutes, a traditional sha-woman who performs female genital mutilation (and offers her services to them), and health care workers for the documentary, they tell the stories of the people behind the statistics and the challenges facing the emerging nation. As they film their discoveries about the disease, we are drawn into the experience of two American women making a documentary about AIDS in an African country. Dianne is coping with the suddend death of estranged father. Surrounded by celebration, she struggles to make sense of her relationship with him as she talks to the survivors of the 20-year civil war with Ethiopia. The Eritreans are encouraged by their government to seek out their former torturers to forgive them in an effort to heal their wounds and move the country forward. Should she do the same? With less need for introspection, her fellow filmmaker joins the celebrations of the first elections in 20 years and a flirtatious relationship eventually adds to the message of the film. Complex, engaging and powerful, the White Hotel is an extraordinary film that stays with the viewer for a very long time.
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