September Tapes
September Tapes
Directed by: Christian Johnston
Written by: Christian Johnston and Christian Van Gregg
Starring: George Calil, Wali Razaqi, Sunil Sadarangani
Independent filmmakers are often looking for some sort of unique angle that will get their movie noticed, something clever that works within their budgetary constraints. With a little outside the box thinking, you just might be the next big thing. On the other hand, it is possible to think so far outside the box that you completely lose your audience.
September Tapes is a very unique film based on an intriguing concept:the seamless mixture of fact with fiction. In the aftermath of the September 11th terrorist attacks, filmmakers Christian Johnston and Wali Razaqi travelled to war-torn Afghanistan to shoot a hybrid documentary/war drama. The basic idea was that they would have actors posing as American journalists on the trail of Osama Bin Laden (one of the actors being Afghani-born Razaqi himself). Along the way they would interview and interact with real Al Qaeda and Taliban members whose own reactions would be unscripted and unpredictable.
George Calil stars as American journalist Don Larson, a gutsy man on a mission determined to track down Bin Laden himself. His reasons are his own, but along with translator Wali and cameraman Sunil they fly to Kabul and begin to network, questioning anyone they can as they try to get a lead on Osama’s whereabouts. Almost immediately, they realize how volatile the environment is. Their guide tells them that it is a dangerous place for Americans to be right now. Locals regard them with suspicion if not outright hostility. They witness a random car bombing and an altercation with local officials lands Larson in jail for the night. But nothing will deter him from his quest. In true Geraldo Rivera fashion, Larson arrogantly soldiers forth, arranging a tense meeting with a weapons dealer that nearly gets them killed, then tracking down real-life bounty hunter Babak Ali who allows them to tag along on his own search for Bin Laden. Out in the wild countryside of Afghanistan, however, they find themselves entering a war zone with no one to protect them, and things quickly get out of hand.
The filmmakers themselves have described September Tapes as The Blair Witch Project meets Apocalypse Now, which is a pretty accurate summary. The movie opens with a caption explaining that the footage you are about to see is taken from 8 tapes that were recovered near the Pakistani border by the Northern Alliance army. It’s impossible not to think of The Blair Witch Project with an intro like that. The problem is that in all of the publicity for this film, Johnston and Razaqi heavily promote the fact that much of the movie was scripted and pre-arranged. I hate to say it, but the hybrid approach ends up creating too much confusion, and the movie could have been much more effective if they had chosen a clear path one way or the other. There would have been nothing wrong with doing an entirely fictional film. As it is, I was too busy wondering what was real and what was fake to really get into the characters. In the end you just resign yourself to the fact that everything is fake anyways.
Of course, it didn’t help that the acting was terrible and the characters do the most unrealistic things. Even if we are to believe that Don Larson is a fearless journalist, he is in a foreign country surrounded by people who hate him — and yet he simply drags his crew into the most dangerous, life-threatening situations possible. Even hard-nosed journalists want to live to get their story out. His reactions in the face of gunfights are also incredibly hard to swallow, and his experience with firearms supposedly explained away by a few years spent in the army. The voice-over narration from his personal diary is the icing on the cake; hokey, over-the-top dialogue that completely obliterates the movie’s documentary feel.
Truth be told, the way in which the movie was shot was pretty convincing. The gritty camerawork gives the illusion of reality (and anyone who felt ill watching the shaky camera movement of The Blair Witch Project will probably want to bring a barf bag to September Tapes too). The explosions and gunfire also look believable (once again the press materials claim it is, in fact, real, but I have my doubts), and if I wasn’t so busy pondering how fake the performances were, I might have found the action a lot more riveting.
Perhaps the most disappointing thing about this movie, though, is the fact that there is no real insight about 9/11, Afghanistan, or the war on terrorism at all here. The movie essentially uses terrorists and Al Qaeda as a boogeyman in place of the Blair Witch to shock and scare viewers. In effect it is just a different kind of horror movie, and when you think about it, it’s kind of short-sighted and irresponsible of the filmmakers. While they may very well have risked their lives to make this movie, they’ve taken a potentially interesting idea and thrown out any elements that could have actually made a lasting impression on viewers. September Tapes may be unique, but it’s not nearly as provocative as I had hoped it would be. — Sean
Comments (15)
I’d still like to see it because I am a fan of both movies that its been compared to.
Plus the whole romantic notion of being in a setting of themujahedeen fighters fighting against the imperialist has its appeal too.
Posted by Baychuk on March 1st, 2005I love this movie. Documentaries are my favorites although this was not a documentary it had my heart beating so fast. I would definitely recommend this movie to everybody. Keep up the good job being an Independent filmmakers. What other movies have you directed.
Posted by Jessie on March 22nd, 2005The ugly American figure came across glaringly. There were no attemps to understand the very ligitimate complaints the world makes about american foriegn policy, which terrorists use to motivate their inductee’s. A Badly made, badly scripted, rah-rah american crap movie.
Posted by Arkayos on March 26th, 2005I watched the movie today and loved it. I have to be honest, I thought it was real until I read the disclaimer saying he characters were fictitious. I think critics are just that…too critical. Great movie very realistic in most aspects.
Posted by Chuck on March 27th, 2005This movie has to be one of the best i have ever seen. Completley believable and a daring adventure
to a place that we can hardly fathom or would even attempt to travel too. I think that it is an amazing story with very genuine characters. At times, You almost wonder why he is so determined to get answers or put his life on the line.
When you do find out why, you understand that you could be just as courageous as he is to stand up for the people you love. And the main thing i gained out of this movie was, that it makes the audience understand that Sept 11th was’nt anything to do with war, but it had everything to do with terror and that is what we are trying to fight.
Terrorism.
Very very good movie, and yeah even though the camera work is a lil shaky, it is minumal to the amount of work and thought that this movie has.
Posted by Mike B on March 28th, 2005Extremely recommended, and i’ve see alot of fliks.
dude wasnt courageous, he was a dumb, cocky asshole who got other people killed
and NEEDLESSLY!
to get revenge. he lied to the camerapeople about his quest, putting his gay little revenge fantasy over the value of their very lives…
its fucking bullshit.
Posted by Goon on March 28th, 2005I watched this movie last night, YEah, I was nieve at first with it and believed it to be true. Well after reading this wow, that is BS that they did this movie. And of course yeah, going into forbidden territory and lasting as long as they did was amazing. And if those iraq people were paid that is BS to afterall who screwed america!!! I am really saddened by the fact that they made a mockery out of 9/11 making this film!! the film did not teach anything about the war on terrorism.
Posted by Cheryl on March 30th, 2005this movie was good. point blank. its far better than all the same crap that you sheep ass people rent. wheres the movie about war journalists being filmed, these journalist die filming war, but someone needs to interview and film these war journalists.
Posted by jesse on April 1st, 2005they did. its called “control room”. watch that instead.
Posted by Goon on April 1st, 2005jesse, you might want to consider watching a REAL documentary on the subject, i highly recommend ‘War Photographer’, or as goon mentioned, Control Room. I assure you although i am a sheep, these two films are not ‘crap’.
Posted by JAY C. on April 1st, 2005jesse, I’ll have you know I dont rent crap. I buy it.
Posted by Goon on April 1st, 2005arkayos is a fucking pice of shit. I loved the movie it shows what fucking animals those terrorist are
Posted by mattyb on May 8th, 2005First of all hats of 2 the director who made such a great fake movie. While seeing the movie, i thought wat the hell there is some thing wrong about the setting. But now i see the film has been shot in Rajashtan (North Indian province) where you see some scripts written in rajasthani (dilect of hindi)especially the rocket hitting the wall and guy in the truck speaking hindi and warning him not to g that side and the cameraman (sunil) which is a hindu name. But anyway folks those afghani, paris bill boards were fake put up for the movie. There is no way would have filmed this in kabul
Posted by tigetr ibrahim on May 27th, 2005This is the worst documentary I have ever seen.
Posted by Durimi (Gjilan) on March 10th, 2008Im a student in a Norwegian media and communication school and I watched this movie with my class and atleast 95% of the class didnt knew it was fake before it ended. all you people that thinks its silly with making a movie that seams like its a documentairy, you should really ask yourselves a question: do you hate this film because it seams like a documentairy or because you really didnt like the movie? i for once think its a great movie and it just make me laugh thinking that i mostly all the time thought it was real.
Posted by Yngve on September 25th, 2008Leave a Reply