You can’t help but be humbled while watching Davis
Guggenheim’s He Named Me Malala, his new documentary that focuses on the
experiences of Malala Yousafzai, the young Pakistani woman was thrust into the
international spotlight in the aftermath of events that occurred on October 9th,
2012. Having protested against the Taliban’s closing of schools and denying
women of education in her home district of Swat, she was shot three times –
once in the head- by members of the group while riding home on a bus.
If you were to survive such an attack, an event such as this
would have sent most people into hiding.
However, Malala is made of firmer stock than this, as she’s recovered
fully after being transported to a hospital in Birmingham, England – where she
and her family now live – and is now an advocate for underprivileged girls and
young women around the world. She has
spoken in front of the United Nations on numerous occasions, met with various
world leaders about her concerns, written a book and was awarded the Noble
Peace Prize while still 17 years of age.
the hope here is that Guggenheim might be able to give us a more complete
picture of this remarkable woman, perhaps showing us how she acts away from the
international spotlight, what motivates her on her crusade to better the lives
of millions like her around the world or what she hopes to accomplish now that
this great onus has been placed upon her.
Unfortunately, the filmmaker is only partially successful as
we are left with questions unanswered though what we are witnessing is
seemingly an intimate portrait. The problem certainly isn’t a lack of access to
his subject as Guggenhiem lived with the Yousafzai family on and off over the
course of a two-year period, filming them at dinner and at play, traveling to
the United States, Africa and other far flung locales to watch Malala her
concerns and visit other girls longing to have the opportunity to learn.
This is compelling up to a point. Most of what we witness seems a bit staged,
particularly scenes with Malala’s father Ziauddin, an educator and activist in
his own right who’s been accused of manipulating his daughter to his own
ends. Many of these charges were brought
forth with the release of Malala’s book “I Am Malala: The Girl Who Stood Up for
Education and was Shot by the Taliban,” which seemed a bit too well written and
pointed in its criticisms. Guggenheim
doesn’t press Ziauddin on the matter and perhaps it’s better than way. Our world is in need of its heroes now more
than ever.
The most delightful moments in the movie occur when the
director catches his subject with her guard down, doing the sorts of things
other teenage girls do. Yes, she can
pick up the phone and get President Obama on the line but she also talks about
boys, plays with her brothers, worries about her schoolwork and longs to have
some more close friends. There’s no calculation
in these moments and seeing Malala in this way makes all she’s accomplished
that much more remarkable.
While Guggenheim provides more than enough screen time to
Ziauddin, Malala’s mother Tor Pekai remains a cypher. Referenced in an animated sequence that
recounts her lack of education, the woman hangs on the fringes of family
functions and frames of the film, an outsider from both realms that we’re
anxious to hear from. What does she
think of her daughter? Is she concerned about her safety? Is there any tension between them that’s
typical of a mother and her teenage daughter?
We’re left wondering.
Malala is a fine documentary, though hardly an
exceptional one. It presents its subject
in a positive light, tells her tale in a brisk, entertaining manner and
succeeds in generating enough curiosity about Malala to prompt the viewer to
keep tabs on what she’ll do next. However, as far as providing any concrete
insights on this woman, that’s left for a more insightful film.
This article appears in Oct 8-14, 2015.
