‘Outraged by Indifference’

Ted Braun's documentary "Darfur Now" tells the story of the crisis through the eyes of six vastly different individuals around the world. There's American Don Cheadle, the Oscar-nominated actor who learned about the troubled Sudanese region while working on the movie "Hotel Rwanda." There's American Adam Sterling, a Jewish student activist who lobbies Congress on divestment from Sudan—and succeeds in getting Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger to sign a bill keeping California's state funds out of the African country. There's Argentine Luis Moreno-Ocampo, the prosecutor of the International Criminal Court who painstakingly gathers the evidence of atrocities needed to get arrest warrants for some of those believed responsible. There's Ecuadorean-born Pablo Recalde, leader of the World Food Program Team in Darfur. And then there are the Sudanese thrust into the conflict: Hejewa Adam, a rebel fighter who took up arms after her baby was beaten to death on her back, and Ahmed Mohammed Abakar, a Darfur farmer trying to help bring order and dignity to the 47,000 people with him in the Hamadea displacement camp.

To be released in November, "Darfur Now" will hit theaters as diplomats and government leaders renew faltering efforts to bring a United Nations-African Union peacekeeping force to Darfur. Braun hopes the film will change the way people feel about Darfur—and inspire them to do something that might make a difference. He spoke to NEWSWEEK's Arlene Getz about the movie, whether documentaries should be used for political advocacy and some hair-raising moments while filming in Sudan. Excerpts:

NEWSWEEK: You wanted "Darfur Now" to give people hope. Why did you decide to adopt a positive approach to tell of such a tragedy?
Ted Braun: I wanted to bring the audience into the subject through the lives of the people who believed they could bring an end to the suffering of Darfur. And I did so with an understanding of how cinema works best. Cinema reaches the most people and has the most lasting effect when it engages people in the humanity of others, allowing them to share in their dreams and hopes.

The film has been previewed by some extremely high-profile audiences: last month to invited guests at the opening session of the United Nations, this week before a range of influential organizations in Washington. What kind of reaction are you getting?
The audience reaction thus far has been very encouraging. At the U.N. there was a standing ovation that went on and on … I was very concerned about screening the movie in front of them, because I figured this was the most knowledgeable group I was likely to get in one room, and the film was meant for generalists, not experts. [So I was pleased] it struck that deep an emotional chord with them.

You have some fascinating footage of [Sudanese Liberation Army] rebel fighters, like Hejewa Adam, training to fight in the bush. How did you get that?
We spent about three weeks with them up in the mountains. It was very, very hot, about 108 degrees, and we were living among them. [Before we went] we didn't know exactly who we were going to meet or exactly where we were going. We had one death-defying moment [on our way to them] when our vehicle was nearly flipped off the edge of a cliff, and all our equipment came tumbling off the back of our truck. As we were starting to turn around, this group of armed men with AK-47s came up, pissed off, and wondered what it was we were doing there … Then up came a really pissed-off guy in shorts and a wifebeater T-shirt, brandishing a pistol. That turned out to be Commander Musa, who was the guy who was expecting us.

Was that your scariest moment?
That moment was fairly tense. We knew we were in rebel territory with the permission of the rebels, and by that time I had been working in Sudan long enough to know that with patience and respect you can resolve most of these complicated situations, but it was certainly disquieting, because there seemed to be a lot of confusion about who we were.