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Friday, August 12, 2011

MOVIE REVIEW
The Whistleblower

Fighting White Slavery + Political Cover-Ups In Bosnia



Rachel Weisz as Kathryn Bolkovac in Larysa Kondracki's drama "The Whistleblower". 
Sophie Giraud/Samuel Goldwyn Films

  

by
Omar P.L. Moore/PopcornReel.com        Follow popcornreel on Twitter FOLLOW                                           
Fri
day, August 12, 2011

"The Whistleblower" marks Larysa Kondracki's potent directorial debut, and the drama packs a lingering stomach punch.  Written by Ms. Kondracki and Ellis Kirwan and based on Kathryn Bolkovac's book of her first-person accounts of United Nations and international community cover-ups of sex trafficking in Bosnia-Hercegovina in the aftermath of the 1994 civil war, "The Whistleblower" is a fierce, urgent look at women under siege physically and politically.

Rachel Weisz powers "The Whistleblower" as Ms. Bolkovac, a Lincoln, Nebraska police officer turned U.N. peacekeeper on a stint in Bosnia as the war there quells.  Bolkovac is Head of Gender Relations, protecting women who are casualties of the Serb-Croat conflict.  She uncovers a kidnapping/sex-trafficking/prostitution ring operated and engaged in by some in her team and international police agencies, under the auspices of a British corporation with contractor ties to the U.S. government.  When most of her male colleagues and superiors turn a blind eye to the atrocities, Bolkovac goes it alone, calling out the perpetrators in a David-versus-Goliath battle while her own safety and job security is increasingly compromised.

As unsettling and grim an experience as you'll have all year in a movie theater, "The Whistleblower" shines a harsh, brutal and much-needed spotlight on the torture and savage violence against women and cover-up of white slavery.  The events are shocking and appalling.  Ms. Kondracki tells the story directly, crisply and bluntly.  Sometimes her camera wanders too much for the sake of style and tension-building but the film's total impact is clear and unwavering.  The truth it pursues echoes the real-life events, many of which were far harsher than this R-rated film shows.

I found Rachel Weisz ("The Constant Gardener") to be so real, compelling and resolute as Kathryn Bolkovac that I was gripped and riveted by her strength and fearlessness.  She's compassionate, brave, heroic and thoroughly persuasive without being overly righteous or canned.  Her title character is a muscular moral figure in dimension, not size, and physically smaller than the real Ms. Bolkovac, ironically a more imposing figure than Ms. Weisz. 

This tense film ties Ms. Bolkovac's personal custody battle for her daughter in a meaningful way: the director divulges the custody information to ground Kathryn's stake in the events that her colleagues willfully ignore or participate in.  Some may argue that the custody subplot is a throwaway but its inclusion is wholly relevant, informing us that Bolkovac isn't a robotic, gung-ho action figure.  Bolkovac's outrage is acute and sincere, partly fomented in surrogacy and second chance to do right, to atone personally while seeking justice on a larger scale.  The second chance she gets is presented in her promise to protect two young girls who fear their safety in Bosnia. 

Never sparing time for sentiment, "The Whistleblower" exposes Kathryn Bolkovac's personal shortcomings.  She's human in a land of the inhumane.  There's a moral equivalency in her cause to her personal affairs and professional travails, and Ms. Weisz uncovers this high-wired balance moment by moment in a smart, sensitive and pulsating way, matching the heartbeat of this absorbing and unnerving film.  Shot by Kieran McGuigan, its cold, abrasive look is marvelous and disorienting.  There's a "Silence Of The Lambs"-Tak Fujimoto-bleakness to the film's visuals.

Vanessa Redgrave and David Strathairn have small, key roles as U.N. higher-ups who face challenges and as much political blow-back as Ms. Bolkovac does.  Ms. Redgrave gives "The Whistleblower" gravitas and Mr. Strathairn its moderated nobility.  Ms. Kondracki's self-assured film gets twisty, but its atmosphere never lets up or lets you down.  On occasion there's a fine line between some of the graphic events glimpsed and a few of those in "Hostel Part II", but their context in "The Whistleblower" is unambiguous, neither glossy nor gratuitous. 

"The Whistleblower", an intense experience, isn't designed to let anyone breathe or exhale easily.  I had a literal headache after seeing it, but a headache of conscience, a reminder of how pervasive and continuous the trafficking of women remains, whether in Africa, Europe, Asia or America.  (It's risky to say this but the years-long nightmare endured by Jaycee Dugard in California may be "rivaled" by the systemic inhumanity in the events of Ms. Kondracki's film.) 

A horror film in its own right, when "The Whistleblower" concludes you feel a fleeting triumph and immense despair: that Kathryn Bolkovac's courage and bravery makes a real difference but an infinitesimal dent in the evils being perpetrated and the unholy alliances backing them.  It's deeply sobering but absolutely necessary viewing.

With: Nikolaj Lie Klaas, Monica Bellucci, Anna Anissimova, Roxana Condurache, Rayisa Kondracki, David Hewlett, Jeanette Hain, Paula Schramm, Alexandru Potocean, Benedict Cumberbatch, William Hope, Coca Bloos, Luke Treadaway.

"The Whistleblower" is rated R by the Motion Picture Association Of America for disturbing violent content including a brutal sexual assault, graphic nudity and language.  The film's running time is one hour and 52 minutes.

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