The parade of suffering yet smiling kids peering into the camera in ABC Africa is endless, and that’s the point. This compassionate, impressionistic documentary, from acclaimed Iranian director Abbas Kiarostami, tries to come to grips with the 1.6 million orphans in Uganda
whose parents succumbed to AIDS. The film provides some facts, but more importantly it shows us these faces. That’s a hallmark of humanism, of which ABC Africa is a shining example. Kiarostami’s camera doesn’t care for the well-spoken officials sitting behind desks as much as it does for the scraggly little boy striving to balance an ungainly bundle of wood on his head. Facts and figures are cold and distant – the everyday struggles witnessed here are universal.
