Lisa F. Jackson

2007, 76 MINUTES, COLOR
PRODUCER / DIRECTOR / CINEMATOGRAPHER / EDITOR:
Lisa F. Jackson

AWARDS, FESTIVALS, & SCREENINGS

Sundance FF, Special Jury Prize: Documentary
London Human Rights Watch FF, Best of Fest
Roma Independent FF, Best Documentary
Human Rights Watch International FF, NY

One World Int’l Human Rights Documentary Film Festival, Prague
San Francisco Human Rights Watch Int’l Film Festival
Full Frame Documentary Film Festival
Addis Int’l Film Festival on Rights and Justice, Addis Ababa
Seattle Human Rights Watch Film Festival

ABOUT AUTHOR:

Lisa F. Jackson is in the business of making documentary for over 30 years now. She is a well know and widely respected american director and the winner of numerous international awards ( three Emmy nominations; two Emmy awards – New York City Emmy for ”Voices and Visions: Emily Dickinson”, ”Jackson Pollock: Portrait, Through Madness”;  and an Outstanding Informational Special for ”The secret life of Barbie” in 1999). Her work so far was recognized by a number of film experts, journalists and critics, and is proclaimed as a recognizable combination of honesty and readiness to couragesly and with dedication create movies of extraordinary documentary value. Lisa F. Jackson studied direction at MIT and thought at University of Colombia, University of Harward and University of New York.

ABOUT THE FILM:

Directed by an American director, Lisa F. Jackson and awarded Special Jury Prize for documentaries at this year’s Sundance Film Festival, “The Greatest Silence: Rape in Congo” is an alarming encounter with the women, the rape victims, of Democratic Republic of Congo, their traumas and every day lives in which they are exposed to brutal violence and torture not only by the enemy army but their “own” soldiers as well. A rape victim herself, Lisa F. Jackson is courageously engaged in this topic made even more dramatic and horrific by silence surrounding it.  Two years ago, “armed” with the camera and the questions “why” and “against whom” are these brutal acts of torture, mutilation, kidnapping and sexual violence committed, this American producer and director set out on a journey across eastern parts of war torn Congo. In the style of determined journalist, she managed to form close, intimate and trusting bond with the women of Africa. So, the material caught on a tape becomes not only a testimonial about rape victims but also a witness of a whole mechanism of evil that stems from the culture of silence and impunity for these crimes.
What’s special about this movie is the “eye to eye” encounter with the soldiers who, tell, coldheartedly and with horrific specifities, about these brutal acts of violence, admitting to their own involvement in them and to the belief that rape “ensures magical powers in the fight against the enemy”. These interviews show the complexity of the problem with the focus on the key aspect of this issue which is the economic conditioning of the warfare in Africa. It also questions the accountability and the quilt of all of us who do not listen to the others, because, in the words of the author, “all of our mobile phones carry the blood of the women of Congo on them.”