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What We Left Unfinished

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What We Left Unfinished

Released Aug 6, 2021

1h 11m

Documentary

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13 Reviews

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WHAT WE LEFT UNFINISHED tells the incredible and mostly true story of five unfinished feature films from the Communist era in Afghanistan (1978-1991) -- when films were weapons, filmmakers became targets, and the dreams of constantly shifting political regimes merged with the stories told onscreen. It is also a story about a tight-knit group of Afghan filmmakers who loved cinema enough to risk their lives for art. Despite government interference, censorship boards, scarce resources, armed opposition, and near-constant threats of arrest and even death, they made films that were subversive and, in the filmmakers' opinions, always "true" to life. All five films -- THE APRIL REVOLUTION (1978), DOWNFALL (1987), THE BLACK DIAMOND (1989), WRONG WAY (1990), and AGENT (1991) -- completed principal photography before being canceled by the state or abandoned by the filmmakers. Never edited, they escaped the final censors' cut. And while all five films are fictional, they each record some aspect of the period. WHAT WE LEFT UNFINISHED brings together the newly rediscovered and restored footage from these lost films with present-day interviews that reveal the behind-the-scenes stories of the filmmakers (including directors, actors, and crew members who often swapped roles), and new footage shot in the same locations by some of the same directors and cinematographers. Just as the original filmmakers did when they shot action scenes with real bullets, hired ex-agents to play spies, or restaged the Communist coup d'état with the army, air force, and an awful lot of tanks and missiles, WHAT WE LEFT UNFINISHED interweaves histories and fictions. We call on the filmmakers to explain how their fictions were constructed, how much truth was in these fictions and how true they sometimes became in their making. And ultimately, we come to understand both the price paid by Afghan filmmakers for the benefits they gained under Communism and the reasons they persisted despite the risks they faced -- and why they still believe that film could save Afghanistan from the divisions tearing it apart today.

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Devika Girish

New York Times

Ghani's... montage of film fragments illustrates and sometimes poetically belies the interviewees' recollections, evoking the ambiguous and unresolved contours of collective memory.

Aug 5, 2021

Full Review

William Repass

Slant Magazine

Mariam Ghani's documentary spurs audiences to consider the politics that underlies any artistic activity.

Rated: 2.5/4

Aug 3, 2021

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Dennis Harvey

Variety

Assembling a few found shards from the recent history of endlessly broken Afghanistan, "What We Left Unfinished" is cultural archaeology of special interest to cineastes.

May 4, 2019

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Kent M. Wilhelm

Tilt Magazine

A project like Ghani’s shows the history that can be lost when the truth that film offers is viewed as a danger to those in power.

Jul 24, 2023

Full Review

Sean Burns

WBUR’s Arts & Culture

The clips have an endearingly amateurish quality, while the filmmakers provide hair-raising anecdotes about their productions.

Sep 2, 2021

Full Review

Molly Adams

In Review Online

Perhaps what's most trying in What We Left Unfinished is that it, like its subject matter, feels genuinely incomplete.

Aug 26, 2021

Full Review

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Mariam Ghani

Director

Mariam Ghani

Producer

Alysa Nahmias

Executive Producer

Adam S. Hogan

Cinematographer

Ian Olds

Film Editing

Qasim Naqvi

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What We Left Unfinished: Trailer 1

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Synopsis

WHAT WE LEFT UNFINISHED tells the incredible and mostly true story of five unfinished feature films from the Communist era in Afghanistan (1978-1991) -- when films were weapons, filmmakers became targets, and the dreams of constantly shifting political regimes merged with the stories told onscreen. It is also a story about a tight-knit group of Afghan filmmakers who loved cinema enough to risk their lives for art. Despite government interference, censorship boards, scarce resources, armed opposition, and near-constant threats of arrest and even death, they made films that were subversive and, in the filmmakers' opinions, always "true" to life. All five films -- THE APRIL REVOLUTION (1978), DOWNFALL (1987), THE BLACK DIAMOND (1989), WRONG WAY (1990), and AGENT (1991) -- completed principal photography before being canceled by the state or abandoned by the filmmakers. Never edited, they escaped the final censors' cut. And while all five films are fictional, they each record some aspect of the period. WHAT WE LEFT UNFINISHED brings together the newly rediscovered and restored footage from these lost films with present-day interviews that reveal the behind-the-scenes stories of the filmmakers (including directors, actors, and crew members who often swapped roles), and new footage shot in the same locations by some of the same directors and cinematographers. Just as the original filmmakers did when they shot action scenes with real bullets, hired ex-agents to play spies, or restaged the Communist coup d'état with the army, air force, and an awful lot of tanks and missiles, WHAT WE LEFT UNFINISHED interweaves histories and fictions. We call on the filmmakers to explain how their fictions were constructed, how much truth was in these fictions and how true they sometimes became in their making. And ultimately, we come to understand both the price paid by Afghan filmmakers for the benefits they gained under Communism and the reasons they persisted despite the risks they faced -- and why they still believe that film could save Afghanistan from the divisions tearing it apart today.

Director: Mariam Ghani
Producer: Mariam Ghani
Distributor: Dekanalog
Production Co: Ajna Films, Indexical Films
Genre: Documentary
Original Language: English
Release Date (Theaters): Aug 6, 2021, Limited
Release Date (Streaming): Sep 21, 2021
Runtime: 1h 11m

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