Human Rights Watch Film Festival: The Devil Came on Horseback November 11, 2007

Annie Sundberg, Ricki Stern, 2006, USA/Chad, 85m, video, doc

Unwilling to accept a desk job but desirous of “serving his country,” Marine Captain Brian Steidle quits his job with the US Marine Corps and accepts a six-month post with the African Union as an unarmed military observer in the western Darfur region of Sudan. Soon after arriving in Darfur, however, Steidle realizes that things are going terribly wrong in this huge, remote province bordering Chad. Unable to intervene, Steidle uses his camera to document what some, including the US Government, have called a genocide—and which without doubt has involved what international law calls “crimes against humanity and war crimes” on a massive scale—the conflict in Darfur that has claimed at least 200,000 lives and displaced 2.5 million people since early 2003. Filmmakers Annie Sundberg and Ricki Stern’s astonishing film allows us to witness Steidle’s transformation from soldier to observer to witness and, finally, to activist. Steidle’s journey becomes ours as the more than 1,000 photographs he took become evidence of a crisis that cannot be denied.

Film's Website: http://www.thedevilcameonhorseback.com

Followed by discussion with Gretchen Steidle-Wallace from Global Grassroots. In English.

6:30 reception with free pizza from Flatbread and coffee from Coffee by Design.

Film begins at 7:00pm, FREE, Screens at Portland High School Auditorium.

Official Website: http://www.space538.org/pages/2007hrwff.php