The Devil Came on Horseback.

"Tonal modulation is everything in a political doc," writes Rob Nelson in the Voice. "The crisis in Darfur - the slaughter of 400,000 black African citizens by the Arab-led Sudanese government and its Janjaweed militia - compels The Devil Came on Horseback to commence in full-on grab-and-shake mode: drums beating as an SUV kicks up dust on a village road, near-subliminal glimpses of charred and mutilated bodies, and a digital-strobe effect obscuring the face of Western compassion - young US Marine turned activist Brian Steidle."

"By following Steidle's journey from archetypal military man to out-and-out activist for the Save Darfur cause, The Devil Came On Horseback finds a solid through-line for its drum-beating agitprop," writes Scott Tobias at the AV Club. "Here's a man whose military roots stretch all the way back to the Revolutionary War, but who can't abide his country's failure to protect Sudan's African citizenry."

Updated through 8/3.

The film "has the most horrifying images I have ever seen in a motion picture," writes Salon's Andrew O'Hehir. It "has galvanized audiences at film festivals around the world precisely because it presents, in its calm, measured fashion and without much ceremony, pictures that nobody really wants to see."

In the New York Times, John Anderson talks with Steidle: "That Mr Steidle, a white, middle-class American from a military family, is the focus of a movie about a black-African catastrophe, is something that might rankle some audiences. If there were a show of hands, Mr Steidle's would be the first one up."

Filmmakers Annie Sundberg and Ricki Stern have been recent guests on the Leonard Lopate Show.

For Salon, Thomas Rogers talks with Sundberg and Stern, too.

Meantime, it looks like an international effort worth taking seriously may finally be coming together. The latest.

Update, 8/3: "World pressure, begun by grass-roots campaigners, but joined early on by President Bush and more recently by China and the Arab League, is finally being felt in Khartoum," notes the New York Times. "Stopping the slaughter must come first. But the challenge of saving Darfur does not end there."

Posted by dwhudson at August 2, 2007 8:17 AM