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Burma VJ/Burma VJ: Reporter i et Lukket Land/Burma VJ: Reporting From a Closed Country (2008) - Important must-see documentary



One striking poster for Anders Østergaard's Burma VJ


In the Danish documentary Burma VJ, we follow the Burmese video reporters in their work of documenting the reality in their country, as the monk uprising of 2007 shakes the repressed country to its core, and is SPOILER ultimately struck down by the ruthless military junta, before a powerful hurricane wrecks additional mayhem on the Burmese people's lives.
Burma VJ [video journalist] is a documentary that transcends any stylistic or aesthetic reservations that one might have with all the hand-held amateur footage in the film. It is so incredibly moving and important that it makes its audiences let go of everything else and simply eat up its raw suspense and later feel an ecstatic joy from its depiction of the heroic struggle of good people of Burma, - as well as feel a pain that strikes one's very soul, SPOILER when those struggles fail to invoke immediate change.
Happily, we have seen in the years since Burma VJ's release that Burma has developed in the right direction, with more openness, freedom and democracy.
Burma VJ was Oscar-nominated as Best Documentary, but lost to the also masterful dolphin-documentary, The CoveBurma VJ is directed by Anders Østergaard, who has made other renowned documentaries like Tintin and I (2003) about Hergé, the man behind Tintin, and Gasolin' (2006) about the beloved Danish rock band.

Related posts:

2008 in films and TV-series - according to Film Excess [UPDATED III]
2008 in films and TV-series - according to Film Excess [UPDATED II]  

2008 in films - according to Film Excess [UPDATED I]
2008 in films - according to Film Excess 

A still from one of the emotionally captivating parts of the outstanding Burma VJ

Budget: Unknown
Box office: 0.1 mil. $ (only US, from just 3 theaters)
= Unknown

What do you think of Burma VJ?
Other masterful documentaries like it that you'd care to recommend?

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