CHRISTOPHER WOOD: TFF DAY 5 â€" DOCUMENTARIES >>>

Is objectivity possible when describing the overwhelming atrocities of war? What responsibilities do documentarians have to people’s suffering? Memorize-you-saw-it and The Corporal’s Diary: 38 Days in Iraq â€" shown Monday at The Grand Cinema as part of the Tacoma Film Festival â€" both emit an unflinching gaze at innocents left only with memories of war’s devastation.

Portland filmmaker Jon Betz’s Memorize chronicles his senior internship as an African aid worker. Last summer he visited Ugandan villages and shot impromptu interviews with youth forced to serve in the Lord’s Resistance Army. As Betz told viewers after the screening, he wanted a film about “the recovery from a war, or the post-war situation for the people involved.” His unglamorous footage takes our focus off the present image; what matters are the words of these children recounting past nightmares. Destitute and made orphans by rebels, the kids nonetheless display a remarkable resilience. One 17-year-old girl, a survivor of rape and slaughter, shyly confides to the camera her wish to act in movies where “love has no end.” Such moments of heartache make Memorize hard to watch â€" and hard to forget.

In Corporal’s Diary, a Bellingham mother pieces together her son’s final days through the work he left behind. Jon Santos served in Iraq barely two months before dying in combat soon after his 22 birthday in 2004. His warmth and humor live on in journal entries (narrated by his younger brother) and video footage of fellow Marines â€" including friend Matthew Drake, who loses his life in his own way.

While Memorize examines raw survival, Diary meditates on loss and sacrifice, and how we all come to know war’s brutal aftermath. Recalling the moment she knew of Jon’s death, the mother stammers through choking tears, “If you could film that, if Americans could see that…” These films and their subjects believe in the power of sight. When the simple act of seeing calls us to act, hope is born.

Tacoma Film Festival schedule
Tuesday, Oct. 7
The Grand Cinema
Full details here

2:30 p.m.
My Dad Ralph, Now You See Me Now You Don’t, Maine, Gravida, The Loneliness of the Short-Order Cook

4:15 p.m.
American Harvest

6:45 p.m.
Gimme Music, Gimme Shelter, Weiner Takes All: a Dogumentary

8:40 p.m.
Partes Usadas (Used Parts)

LINK: South Sound Restaurant Guide