This reviewer had no idea that this problem still existed on what used to be the Maginot line, the WWI trenches between France and Germany. De-miners are killed all the time it’s a dangerous line of work. ![]() An interesting fact: the French government stopped releasing figures on how many farmers are killed each year by these WWI bombs because it is too devastating. Hundreds of thousands of soldiers and civilians were killed at Verdun and its environs, and de-miners (the men who find and safely explode the bombs) and civilians are still casualties of that long-ago pointless war. The unexploded bombs left by the intense and massive shelling in the Verdun area in 1916-yes, World War I!-are still active underground in forests, fields, pastures, new housing developments, and cultivated farm acreage. This is an issue that most people do not ponder, the continual killing that wars, supposedly “ended”, will engender. All of these will kill, and continue to kill, for centuries to come. The film takes us to France, Russia, Vietnam, and Bosnia (Sarajevo) and examines what war leaves behind: the ordnance, the shrapnel, the thousands of tons of unexploded grenades, bombs, and gas canisters, the landmines, the environmental pollution and the seeds of genetic disaster. It should be seen by every human being, everywhere on earth. The powerful message of Aftermath: The Remnants of War, based on a prize-winning 1997 book by Donovan Webster, resonates throughout this moving, exemplary documentary film. “War has a dirty secret-it never really ends.”
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |