The Road to Guantanamo

I was very pleasantly surprised by this movie. I had read fairly mixed reviews so I shied away when it came out last year.

This reminded of Touching the Void in that it mixes interviews with amazing re-enactments of the events described. Winterbottom also deftly weaves in new footage into the mix. The film is about three young British Muslims who traveled to Pakistan for a wedding in October 2001. Foolishy, they decide to travel into Afghanistan just to check out what was going on.

As soon as they arrived in Afghanistan, they got swept up in the American invasion. They end up in the fun environs of Guantanamo. The film brilliantly depicts the absurdity and the degradation of the whole damn thing. It is one thing to read about the treatment at Guantanamo but an entirely different thing to see a filmed recreation of it. This is a very good, enlightening, and quite depressing film.

Directed by Michael Winterbottom and Mat Whitecross
2006
Starz Cinema