There is so much wrong about this, I am not sure where to start

[dangermousie]

I don't follow American entertainment very closely (after all, I already obsess over Korean one and books and I do need to sleep and play with Baby Mousie sometimes) but I was vaguely aware of Angelina Jolie making her directorial debut in a movie which was a love story set during the civil war in former Yugoslavia. "Hmmmm,can be interesting" thought I but that was the extent of it.

Until today, when I learned that "[h]er directorial debut deals with a Bosnian Muslim woman falling for a Serbian soldier who rapes her during the Bosnian war."

I repeat: Her directorial debut deals with a Bosnian Muslim woman falling for a Serbian soldier who rapes her during the Bosnian war.

EXCUSE ME????

THE FUCK???????

Just to make it clear, this isn't supposed to be some hard-hitting look at damages of war. No, this has been escribed as a sweeping star-crossed love story.

Can I barf in the corner now?

Is she going to do a follow-up about a Jewish woman and a SS officer who kills her family but then they fall for each other? Or how about a romantic comedy about a Tutsi widow having to move in with a Hutu militia member who torched her place and killed her neighbors and then they bond?

WHAT THE HELL IS WRONG WITH HER, SERIOUSLY.

I like messed-up love stories, but there is messed-up and there is really sick and disgusting and "how could you even think about this?".

But maybe I am just being a curmudgeon. Who doesn't adore love blossoming between a genocidal rapist and his victim? Awwwwwwww.

Comments

[dangermousie.livejournal.com]

Well, she got banned from Bosnia because of it, so the rumor must have some teeth behind it - if it's untrue she should clarify it to them asap so she'd be allowed to film.

[grace-om.livejournal.com]

A rumor must be true? Come on. People jump to wrong conclusions on incomplete information all the time. She is, apparently, trying to sort it out. However, even if it's just a love story between a Bosnian woman who's been raped by a Serbian man, and a *different Serbian man who didn't rape anyone* it *still* might not be a good film to make. In other settings, such a basic plot might work, but...

[dangermousie.livejournal.com]

True but it's not a random blogger jumping to conclusions - it's a government ministry which I think makes a difference.

[grace-om.livejournal.com]

It's a government ministry under pressure from Bosnian rape victims. Of course the government should respond to the sensitivities of their people -- who have suffered so much. Still, the whole thing may be based on a misunderstanding (consider the furor over Shirley Sherrod, for example).

[grace-om.livejournal.com]

From what she says, it's a total misunderstanding and she's resubmitted the application to shoot along with a complete script.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/10/15/angelina-jolie-to-bosnia-_n_764078.html

[dangermousie.livejournal.com]

I guess we'll see if she gets her permit back.

[grace-om.livejournal.com]

Even if she doesn't, that's hardly proof that it's a "rape love story" -- just that Ministry prefers not to have a controversy.

I'm really not that interested in defending her -- it may be a crappy unwise movie. I just finding it disturbing when people jump to conclusions and outrage, and tweet it all over the world, without trying to learn the fuller details.

[sisterjune.livejournal.com]

Yeah I think the movie is a bad idea period but its scary how fast and furious misinformation can spread in this day and age and people are kicking up a fuss already without doing any further investigation and I mean this is a serious thing so before I'd want to believe Jolie would make such a film I'd want to do a bit more reading first. That said this is a sensitive topic to many (both the rape and the vicious ethnic war/genocide) so the knee jerk reactions are understandable to me all the same.

[dangermousie.livejournal.com]

Well, I saw it on reputable blogs but I am sure the correction can/will come out just as fast.