Synopsis
Made under extraordinary, and extremely dangerous, conditions, Jirga tells the emotional story of a former Australian soldier who travels to Afghanistan to seek forgiveness.
2018 Directed by Benjamin Gilmour
Made under extraordinary, and extremely dangerous, conditions, Jirga tells the emotional story of a former Australian soldier who travels to Afghanistan to seek forgiveness.
On Monday night, I saw Jirga. It moved slow and it was short. It is admirable that the filmmakers undertook this project and filmed in Afghanistan despite several problems. However, the premise is that a former soldier (played by Sam Smith, no not that Sam Smith) goes back to the people he victimized demanding forgiveness. On one hand, it was a brave thing to explore, but I was left kind of cold. I didn't know Australia had sent soldiers to Afghanistan. I was affected by the war too as I had a family member do two tours in Iraq. What made me most upset is thinking about how Dick Cheney profited off the war while the soldiers had to battle…
Mike (Sam Smith), an Australian soldier, took part in a raid on a Kandahar village three years ago and killed a man. Now, driven by guilt, he’s smuggled himself and lots of money into Kabul, hoping to find the man’s family, pay them for their loss and ask for their forgiveness.
As a movie, it’s the story of the good, the bad, and the ugly. The good is the middle portion. Mostly everything from when Mike is captured by the Taliban to them releasing him to go pay his penance actually works, amazingly. It probably shouldn’t, but there is an unspoken, “I’m sorry, the crazy white man is here for what now?” attitude amongst the Taliban soldiers, leading to the…
Can't say that I'm that well educated on any of the politics of the war in Afghanistan and Australia's relationship/business with it or the way this film portrays its people, specifically the Taliban, however Jirga tells a simple, seemingly uncomplicated and breezy story of an ex military solider who comes to seek forgiveness for a murder he committed during his time in the war. It's shot with a real sincerity towards the Afghan geography and showcases some of its stunning landscapes spectacularly, but in the end it falls a little flat and paves perhaps too simple a path from where it sets out to where it wants to end up. I admired its intentions, but left wanting something maybe a little weightier than what was given.
This definitely deserves props for shooting on location in Afghanistan, but loses some credibility for its “the Taliban aren’t so bad once you get to know them!” theme.
Watched on Stan
Respect and admiration must be given for the ambitious effort to shoot this in such remote locations in Afghanistan. The plot is interesting however; if I’m going to be honest, in my opinion, its not a very good film. The 80-minute runtime is actually deceiving as its quite a slog making it feel longer than it actually is. With such an engaging storyline you’d expect quite a lot of emotion however; you just don’t get it here which is a shame.
An Australian soldier commits a crime (of conscience) in the Afghanistan War fighting. Thee years later he returns to the country, risking Taliban capture, to make amends. This simple film is an almost biblical parable of contrition and redemption. Despite its simplistic message it works...mainly because Sam Smith is so convincing in the role of the ex-soldier. But also because its "simplistic" message is heartfelt and valuable in today's divided world.
Benjamin Gilmour's Jirga carries an important message: Take responsibility for your actions. While reading other reviews I saw a few criticising that he went back to ask for forgiveness. However, that's something which is written in the synopsis, but in the film his motives are more complex than that. It rather seems that he realised how wrong his doing was and obviously he cannot take the blame for the war, the shoulders or Australia, but he can take responsibility for his own actions. I actually really like the idea
San Smith was not the best choice in my opinion. Overall, he did an okay job, but especially in the village scenes and even in some with the Taliban group, his…
Reading up on this, it was actually shot in Afghanistan, so kudos for that. For a desert style film this looks pretty good, you really get that desolate baron feel pretty quickly. It has solid themes of regret, forgiveness and redemption, and I admire they show both sides of the story, even if the other side is the Taliban. It does take a while to get going, and is slow at points, so take it or leave it.
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Succeeds at placing you in an environment, and situations, of striking significance, but without seeming entirely to convey their impact.
The purveying problem with virtually every western produced war film is that, no matter if they revel in bravura violence, the sorrow of trauma, or abjectly denounce the horror of war, these movies are ultimately all about how killing brown people make white people feel bad.
JIRGA admirably tries to face this conundrum head on, doing its best to humanize the Afghan people and express the genuine repentance of a guilty conscience, though its sparse story/construction is at once it’s great strength and great weakness.
Whereas the French film NEITHER HEAVEN NOR EARTH is perhaps the best of these modern warfare films about guilt via its use of supernatural/spiritual/horror metaphor, JIRGA is a stripped down bare bones appeal to forgiveness.…
I liked the premise and what they were trying to do with this film but ultimately it felt like a film that just needed a lot more.
More of a concrete plot: I had no idea what the main character wanted at all and his motives weren’t clear until 2/3 of the way through the movie.
More dialogue: No one really spoke much in this film. I understand the language barrier thing but even then, I didn’t care for the protagonist because he didn’t talk at all.
More movement: Especially in the middle half there are a bunch of scenes of characters sitting and doing nothing without any plot contribution.
More of the Driver character because he was amazing.