Massaoud, L´Afghan

“Afghanistan. A country far away, at war, which no one gives a damn about. That is, hardly anyone... In the modern´s world tumult of pictures and sounds, does pointing a camera still mean anything? When I began this film 16 years ago, I didn´t ask myself that question. I was going to meet some remarkable men like Commander Massoud. Not junk heroes, or some kind of marketed product so many of which are manufactured for us these days. I have brought together what remains of this extraordinary adventure in order to resist all the deceptions which surround us... and for something more precious, which I am going to entrust you.” These are the first words of the film begun in 1981 in the secrecy of the Afghan War and now to the Islamic Talibans. I tell the story of two kinds of loneliness, and two struggles: that of a warrior, a charismatic hero of the Afghan resistance when it stood up to the Soviet Army, and my own, that which belongs to one who films and who questions himself. Bear witness, yes, but a voice crying in which wilderness? Over 90 minutes, the story moves through the destiny of an ”hero” and of a filmmaker whose vision reaches perhaps a greater maturity. Tragic adventure. A film, for me, will always be like a thread, fragile certainly, but which joins us to another.