AS IF I AM NOT THERE UK DVD review

(Yes, I already wrote up this impressive but deeply flawed movie when it screened at the 2011 Bradford International Film Festival - but the amount of positive press it received made me want to give it a second chance, so this is more or less a completely new review.)

When you see footage from a war zone, especially footage shot by someone who knows what they're doing, you can respond to it in a number of different ways but you'd probably never think of it a good film. Juanita Wilson's As If I Am Not There feels something like this; based on true accounts of some of the atrocities visited on prisoners in the Bosnian conflict, it's put together by a talented director with a profound sense of empathy for the horrible things she shows going on and it's often terrifyingly real. But it's simply not a particularly good film.

As If... dumps us almost straight into stomach-churning horror with virtually no introduction or any real sense of place. The verisimilitude doesn't make up for the fact there's no exploring the subject matter or moral shading where it's most needed, and perhaps worst, in adapting the material for the screen Wilson and her crew settle for some dismally lazy clichés. As If... is harrowing, expertly crafted (well, some of it is) and difficult to forget: it's also vacant, simplistic and emotionally manipulative. It's war footage plus Hollywood schmaltz laid on with a trowel, and that doesn't make for a good film.

The story follows Samira (Natasha Petrovic), a young woman from Sarajevo who's just landed a position as the schoolteacher in a remote rural village. Vivacious and headstrong, she's determined to make a go of things, but not long after she arrives the Serbian army roll into town. Rounding up the villagers, the Serbs summarily execute all the men and cart the women off to a staging post in the wilderness. The older or less attractive get saddled with menial jobs, while the rest are pressed into service as playthings for the soldiers - raped, brutalised and summarily 'disappeared' once they've been used up.

Once she realises there's no help coming any time soon - even if anyone knows where the women are there's little chance they'd do anything about it - Samira realises that if she can't escape her captivity she can at least accept there are things she can do to make it easier on herself. As If... may be vacant in some respects but it does have a point to make beyond leaving the audience with shell-shock; there's the obvious historical record, but it's also about the human capacity for survival, and how much it can cost; it's about guilt, and what it takes to get over that.

The thing is there's no sense of this being developed with any real finesse. Obviously you care about the things you see in war footage, unless you're a brain-dead teenager parked in front of YouTube 24-7, but chances are you don't truly empathise. Self defense means you're limited to a generalised, low-grade nausea thinking oh my God, how awful, because you don't know these people and you can't possibly cope with feeling distraught every time anyone in the world has to suffer. You can't begin to understand who the casualties in a war were from five minutes of video off an Apache helicopter's gun cam, and for all its realism As If... falls headlong into this particular trap.

We get barely ten minutes with Samira before the horror gets under way, and the only character development in that time is painted in ridiculously broad strokes. When she's setting off her father gives her a Look (that goes unnoticed) when she won't wear a headscarf, and seeing the villagers openly staring when all their women are modestly covered practically screams that the poor girl's about to get a harsh lesson in how the world really works. Every protest Samira mounts, spoken or unspoken, seems less like a plausible, nuanced human reaction and more as if she's a cipher whose loss of innocence just serves to further express oh my God, how awful.

To be fair, As If... is often undeniably horrific. It's hard to criticise the film when all it wants to do is show you how this was a living nightmare where no-one intervened. Natasha Petrovic is phenomenal when she's not saddled with mediocre scripting - the scene where Samira is raped has to count as one of the most hideous assaults on the human psyche ever put to film, with the actress looking as if she's genuinely fearing for her life. Her slow transformation in the final act and the realisation in the epilogue that even her freedom comes with a price are almost as effective.

But it's impossible to buy into this completely when you're thrown in at the deep end in such a clumsy way. As If... does itself irreparable harm when you know precisely what's coming, when the film makes no attempt to pretend any different, yet all Samira can do is stand there dumbfounded again and again. Petrovic gives a fantastic performance, yes, but it doesn't stop you asking how could she not know what was happening? How can she not tell how much worse it's going to get? There's no attempt at answering these questions, whether explaining what people in the region actually knew about the conflict back then or why people behave the way they do in wartime. Every plot point feels like a blunt instrument at best, or tired cliché at worst.

It's simply not enough to string a bunch of terrible things together until you've got enough running time for a full-length feature, and all too often that is exactly what As If... turns out to be. There's skill and some extraordinary talent here but if you look at everything that's not directly about pain and suffering in isolation, you've got a mediocre melodrama at best - sometimes this approach is just an annoyance, but when Wilson plasters the climax with lilting, sugary strings and epic camerawork it's practically an insult. She clearly feels deeply for the horrors these women went through, and As If I Am Not There makes for a sickeningly convincing historical re-enactment. As a film, though, it's above average at best.

THE DISC

Element Pictures' UK DVD of As If I Am Not There (available to buy from today, the 26th September) is a very bare-bones, if serviceable release that provides an adequate way to watch the film - though it's not likely to tempt any videophiles. The disc starts with a trailer for Essential Killing, which can be skipped. The main menu is just still images set to one of the piano pieces from the score, but it's clear and easy to navigate. The film has been divided into twenty-four chapter stops.

The basic 2.0 stereo track - 5.1 surround is also available - is clear and legible, though As If I Am Not There contains little if anything to strain anyone's speakers. Dialogue and FX are consistently audible other than individual scenes where the audio intentionally falls away. English subtitles are fixed - burnt-in - and fairly small, though clear and well-written with few if any spelling or grammatical errors.

Assuming the disc I have is the retail version, given it has menus and extras in place, the picture is adequate at best. Juanita Wilson is a more than competent director, technically, with one or two visually arresting set-pieces in As If..., yet this DVD doesn't do Wilson many favours - it looks like a festival screener ported over as is, with blurring, lack of definition and constant flickering grain like an old VHS tape. It's perfectly watchable, but videophiles won't like paying full price for it.

The sole extra is the trailer, which much like the film tries to hit you with the horror first and foremost rather than establishing any kind of buildup and gives away far too many key shots in the process.

As If I Am Not There is definitely a brave and worthy production with an astonishing central performance, but it needs to be said it's by no means a particularly good film. Juanita Wilson has real talent and dedication but she struggles to balance getting her audience to realise the full horror of the story she's telling with any kind of functional narrative framework, and for every part of the movie that leaves you shaken and reeling there's another to have you grinding your teeth in frustration. The acclaim it's been getting is bewildering - what could have been a devastating little piece of work is dragged down by one too many amateurish and inappropriately sentimental dramatic tropes. Should you want to see it, Element Pictures' UK DVD is an adequate, though fairly workmanlike release.

(Thanks go to Element Pictures and EM Foundation PR for facilitating this review.)