07/09/2006

After the Venice Days screening of L'étoile du soldat [+see also:
trailer
film profile] (The Soldier’s Star), a room full of spectators – most of whom still had tears in their eyes – greeted this work of a lifetime (which represents 25 years of Christophe de Ponfilly's life, emphasised the producers) with a long standing ovation.

By making this one and only fiction feature (and making sure he left us a masterpiece before his adieu), the late reporter, known for his great knowledge and passion for Afghanistan, indeed intended his subject to have an impact no documentary ever could.

In choosing to tell the (true) story of a Russian musician, Nikolai, who reluctantly joins the Soviet troops in Afghanistan and ends up a prisoner of Massoud's Mujahiddins, with whom he gradually fraternizes, Ponfilly surely hoped the public would identify with this profoundly pacifist hero and also realise that, unlike the propaganda on both sides, apart from some slight differences, all human beings are the same.

Besides the fact that The Soldier’s Star is the result of extremely thorough research, beyond the splendid photography and the oh-so-meaningful dialogue, beyond the immensely poetic inventions throughout the entire film (a Russian soldier fights dejection by smiling and amusing his fellow soldiers with magic tricks to end up losing both arms; an impressively courageous little Afghan girl; the image of an utterly confused Nikolai among the dead bodies of a fellow Russian and his new Afghan friend, to name a few) and the reflection on images suggested by the presence of a French reporter, beyond even Ponfilly's accusations against the CIA, this splendid movie is an ode to brotherhood by a Carl Sandburg of cinema.

L'étoile du soldat is a French/German/Afghan co-production between Albert Films, Voltaire Production, NEF Filmproduktion and Afghan Film. International sales are being handled by Les Films du Losange.

(Translated from French)