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'WATCHERS OF THE SKY' A POWERFUL WARNING ABOUT GENOCIDE
Los Angeles Times, CA
Oct 17 2014
Review
The documentary "Watchers of the Sky" centers on Raphael Lemkin,
who coined the word "genocide" and devoted his life to ensuring that
the systematic extermination of people would be an international crime.
Henryk Sienkiewicz's depiction of the Roman Empire's slaughter of
early Christian converts in the novel "Quo Vadis," as well as the 1915
Armenian massacre, provoked in the young Lemkin -- a Polish Jew born
in 1900 -- a profound revulsion. He studied law at Lviv University
in Ukraine, became a prosecutor and presented at the 1933 League of
Nations conference in Madrid. But his caution about history repeating
itself fell on deaf ears.
In 1941, Lemkin fled the Nazis for the United States. Here, he
tirelessly courted ambassadors to the United Nations and entreated them
to ratify the Genocide Convention he had drafted. Though adopted in
1951, its actual implementation came half a century later in a case
against Sudanese President Omar Hassan Ahmed Bashir. Filmmaker Edet
Belzberg juxtaposes Lemkin's biography with the Sudanese refugees
camped in eastern Chad and former International Criminal Court chief
prosecutor Luis Moreno Ocampo mounting the case against Bashir.
Samantha Power, U.S. ambassador to the United Nations and
Pulitzer-winning author of "A Problem From Hell: America and the Age
of Genocide," narrates Lemkin's story beautifully. The film's message
is so powerful, some of the poetic flourishes are unnecessary.
Animation sequences that earned recognition at Sundance have a
once-upon-a-time quality that seems allegorical, a disservice to a film
that reminds us that genocide is recurrent, not an isolated incident.
------------
"Watchers of the Sky"
MPAA rating: None.
Running time: 2 hours, 1 minute.
Playing: Laemmle's Royal, West Los Angeles; Laemmle's Town Center
5, Encino.
http://www.latimes.com/entertainment/movies/la-et-mn-watchers-of-the-sky-review-20141017-story.html
Los Angeles Times, CA
Oct 17 2014
Review
The documentary "Watchers of the Sky" centers on Raphael Lemkin,
who coined the word "genocide" and devoted his life to ensuring that
the systematic extermination of people would be an international crime.
Henryk Sienkiewicz's depiction of the Roman Empire's slaughter of
early Christian converts in the novel "Quo Vadis," as well as the 1915
Armenian massacre, provoked in the young Lemkin -- a Polish Jew born
in 1900 -- a profound revulsion. He studied law at Lviv University
in Ukraine, became a prosecutor and presented at the 1933 League of
Nations conference in Madrid. But his caution about history repeating
itself fell on deaf ears.
In 1941, Lemkin fled the Nazis for the United States. Here, he
tirelessly courted ambassadors to the United Nations and entreated them
to ratify the Genocide Convention he had drafted. Though adopted in
1951, its actual implementation came half a century later in a case
against Sudanese President Omar Hassan Ahmed Bashir. Filmmaker Edet
Belzberg juxtaposes Lemkin's biography with the Sudanese refugees
camped in eastern Chad and former International Criminal Court chief
prosecutor Luis Moreno Ocampo mounting the case against Bashir.
Samantha Power, U.S. ambassador to the United Nations and
Pulitzer-winning author of "A Problem From Hell: America and the Age
of Genocide," narrates Lemkin's story beautifully. The film's message
is so powerful, some of the poetic flourishes are unnecessary.
Animation sequences that earned recognition at Sundance have a
once-upon-a-time quality that seems allegorical, a disservice to a film
that reminds us that genocide is recurrent, not an isolated incident.
------------
"Watchers of the Sky"
MPAA rating: None.
Running time: 2 hours, 1 minute.
Playing: Laemmle's Royal, West Los Angeles; Laemmle's Town Center
5, Encino.
http://www.latimes.com/entertainment/movies/la-et-mn-watchers-of-the-sky-review-20141017-story.html