James Longley On Iraq In Fragments

The annual Human Rights Watch International Film Festival has been going from strength to strength. Among an extraordinary roster of films in 2006, it saw the UK premiere of American James Longley's Sundance Award-winning documentary Iraq In Fragments. A fascinating and important insight into what life is like in post-Saddam Iraq, this is a film that would have been impossible to make in the current security emergency.

The film is divided into three parts. Part one is seen through the eyes of Mohammed, an 11-year-old auto-mechanic working for his domineering uncle. Despite the fact that Saddam murdered his father, Mohammed is witness to a growing disenchantment with the US-led occupation, in a working-class Sunni quarter of old Baghdad.

Part two is filmed inside the Shiite political/religious movement of Moqtada Al Sadr, travelling between Nasiriyah and the holy city of Najaf. As tensions mount inside the country, we see the inner workings of Iraqi local politics, with the Sadr movement pushing for regional elections and enforcing its interpretation of Islamic law.

In part three, Langley travels north to follow the Kurdish bid for independence as witnessed by a family of rural brickmakers. While the patriarch ruminates on his family, his people and God, his teenage son Sulieman tends sheep and dreams of becoming a doctor, despite his father's desire that he serve God.

Making Movies caught the film at London's Brixton Ritzy cinema and grabbed a Q&A with the director.

How did you set yourself up in Iraq?
I'd made friends with some Iraqi expats and they gave me some contacts in Baghdad. Immediately following the war it was easy to get started on the ground in Iraq. I stayed first in a small hotel, then in an apartment, then moved into the house of one of the Iraqi translators I was working with. I lived in a middle-class residential neighbourhood in central Baghdad for about eight months until the security situation collapsed in April, 2004, forcing me into a more secure apartment.

How about finding people to work with?
It wasn't as difficult as people imagine. Many Iraqis speak passable English; many people were looking for work after the war. Most of the Iraqi translators I worked with in Baghdad were young people: university students who had never worked with the media before, and had no left-over baggage from the previous regime. One contact would lead to another.

Next page • "Iraqi translators, fixers and drivers are the unsung heroes of Western journalism"