Name: Adrian Meza

Period: 4B
Title:
The Silent Army
Year release date:
2008
Language of film:
Dutch
Director:
Jean van de Velde
Actors:
Marco Borsato
Thekla Reuten
Abby Mukiibi Nkaaga
Andrew Kintu
Siebe Schoneveld

Summary:
A young boy by the name of Abu lives in Africa. He lives in poverty but seems to be a
very happy boy. He has a best friend by the name of Thomas (a white boy) whose dad, Eduard,
runs a pretty high class restaurant in Africa. One day Abu is sent by Eduard to give Thomas his
orange soccer shirt and white shoes at Thomass school. Abu goes to deliver his cloth but by the
time Abu gets to the school, Thomas has been sent to detention and sent away by teachers. Abu
takes Thomass soccer stuff to his house. Once Abu gets home it's night and Abus family is
conversing outside. Abu decides to try on Thomass orange soccer shirt and white soccer shoes
and starts to play soccer by himself. While playing with a ball, he kicks it out into the dark trees.
He goes out to find it and once he finds it he is met by a rebel group. The rebel group starts
killing all of the parents of the little village in which Abu lives. They see that Abu is looking at
his dad as they are about to kill him and order Abu to kill his father. They tie up all of the
children and take the children with them. The next morning government troops are in Abus
village but by that time the rebels have left with all of the children and all they find is all of the
adults murdered. Thomas and his dad show up in search for Abu and his family to see if they are
okay but only find Abus fathers decapitated head being taken pictures by a journalist.
Meanwhile Thomas is looking for Abu, the rebels arrive at their base where the kids meet the
rebel general Michel Obeke. The rebel general starts to brainwash the children into believing
whatever he says and demand they call him daddy. Back home Thomas is getting frustrated as
they cannot find Abu, he keeps asking his dad Eduard if he thinks Abu is alive. Seeing as Abu
has not come back Thomas decides to run away to try and find him. Back in the rebel camp, the
general disciplining all kids who do not want to be there. He asks who would like to go home
and once a child says that they do he orders another child to kill them as they have become a
trader. But the kid assigned to kill the trader refuses he orders all of the other kids to kill both
of them, among the kids Abu is one of the first to attack as they point a gun to his head. After
Eduards search for Thomas around the city, he decides to go to a child protection place where
he does end up finding Thomas. Eduard sees that Thomas won't be the same without Abu; he
takes Thomas to a reservation full of children being protected by the government in search of
Abu. At the reservation Eduard sees once again the reporter who was taking the pictures of
Abus father. Eduard meets a lady who is in charge of the reservation and asks for her help. He
eventually finds where Abu might be and leaves Thomas at the reservation so he may go in
search for Abu. Once close to the rebels camp, Eduard is captured by rebels and taken to the
general. At this time the general is conducting business to purchase guns, bombs, and ammo.
Eduard is brought to the general when he realizes he knows Eduard, he was a daily client for his
restaurant a long time ago and they had been friends. Since the general knows Eduard and
because Eduard is white he won shoot and kill him. Eduard lets the general know that he wants
to find and take Abu and offers him money to take Abu with him. The general agrees but when
he takes Eduard to Abu, Abu says he does not know him as he has been brainwashed. The
general then tells Eduard that Abu is not here and orders his troops to escort him out after giving
Eduard poisoned tea. Abu is one of the troops to escort Eduard out. As Eduard is being escorted,
he attacks the troops and tries to take Abu by force. Abu escapes and runs back to camp, Eduard
follows him. Eduard has a gun pointed at the general as he has Abu in his hands when he plans to
escape and the general lets him because he know he would die soon. But what the general does
not know is that one of his slaves drank the poisoned tea to save Eduard. As Eduard is escaping
the general realizes that he was not poisoned and tries to kill Eduard but the poisoned slave holds
a grenade near the bombs and ammo to let them escape. The slave then lets the grenade go off as
they escape and then the film ends.

What social issues did the film address?
It addresses the problem in Africa with the children driven army. I think it also shows that even
though most kids are brained washed; there are still some kids that are still trying to fight the
rebels. I also think it brings up how much children can do when put in an army. Kids are more
likely to do whatever you want because they are gullible.

What cultural differences did you notice in the film?
I noticed that Thomas, the white boy, had more money than Abu, the black boy. The way of
living for Abu was in a small poor village. I really liked that Abu had a wooden made controller
while Thomas play with his real controller. It was cool to see that they both traded their
controllers and enjoyed both controllers because they are kids. I also noticed that kids are the
same everywhere; they see the positive in everything no matter what it is. Kids don't see color
and I love that about them.

Would you recommend this film to others?
I would definitely recommend this film. It was great over all, I work at a movie theater and I
have seen many films and this one was one of the best films I have seen.

Would you enjoy seeing another film of this nature?
I would. It made my emotions go up and down so I think that when a film shifts your emotions, it
can really make for a good film.

Why do you think I assigned a foreign film?
I think it was assigned to show the difference of cultures. This is the easiest way to show other
cultures and its just fun to watch. For me, I had an idea of Africa and this really showed me
what is going on as far child armies and day to day living.