I didn’t know what to expect from this movie, the only thing I knew about it was that it was about child soldiers from Uganda. I usually try not to read any review prior to seeing a film to avoid forming an opinion.
Now, I have seen it and have mixed feelings about Invisible Children. I know that what it shows is real but I consider the movie is not honest and that tarnishes the message it’s suppose to convey. The first part of the film ruins what follows and ends up hurting the credibility of the story.
The “documentary” tells the story of three spoiled American young men from California that out of boredom decide to travel to Africa to film something. First they go with the idea of capturing images of the Darfur crisis, but when they get there they are unable to access the region so they wander around without any interesting subject worth filming. Until they travel to the refugee camps in Uganda where they meet children that were used as soldiers by the Lord’s Resistance Army and say “Hey guys, this is it, lets turn on the camera!”.
How can I believe that these men care about the children of Uganda when the movie starts with them throwing up in front of the camera and spending time killing snakes and burning termites just for fun?
Sincerely I can’t respect anyone that kills an animal or any living creature just because he thinks it’s fun too see them suffer and die. If you care about people, you care about the land and its inhabitants, whether they are human beings, animals, insects or plants.
After seeing the first scenes, I started to dislike the filmmakers and to be a bit unsure about their intentions.
They interview people who tells a bit of the story of the war in Uganda and also of the consequences of that war: the broken lives of child soldiers.
The images are sad and the stories much more but there is something that immediately comes to my attention. After watching for a while, I realized that this movie couldn’t have been done by three amateurs filmmakers with just a camera. The camera movement, lighting, photography, all look professional and it’s obvious that some of the scenes were made with equipment and knowledge that only comes from a somewhat expert crew.
So, are these just three young men that traveled to Africa with just a camera, or are they presented this way just to make the story more captivating?
If they are who they say they are, I looks like they were just trying to gain some fame. If they are not, they are just acting to make a good story.
The film pretends to show something like: “The story of three young men who after meeting the children of Uganda transformed their lives to help those in need”.
They have their own charity now that gathers money and other resources for their project which I’m not going to cast an opinion about.
This is only about the documentary and really I’ve seem better films that look much more honest and clear. I know that even documentary films have some scenes not happening in real time and that they are necessary to tell a story, like reconstructions of moments and places, but there is something about Invisible Children that keeps looking phony to me, but this is just my personal opinion. It’s not about the children of Uganda, the story is totally true, it’s about the makers and the film.
If you want to see it, here is the link to the free documentary online.

 
AliciA