The opening scenes of Hollywoodgate are quite shocking. The sight of women being beaten in the streets by members of the Taliban, another executed in broad daylight prime us for the kind of fundamentalist movement that film director Ibrahim Nash’at set out to document.
But of course, he would never be allowed, as he admits at the end of the film, to show the suffering of the Afghani people, but Nash’at managed to use his standing as an international journalist to negotiate with the Taliban who agreed to let him film them - and only them - hoping, one would expect, a Hello! Magazine-style At Home with the Taliban type documentary.
Whether madness or bravery on his part, the result is a visceral depiction of what motivates this organisation which is seen by many as being beyond the pale – but also one with which America has forged alliances with over at the years in the fight against perceived common enemies.
However when the US left in a bit of a rush in October 2021, it opened the door for the reconquest of Afghanistan by the Taliban’s mujahideen.
What Nash’at filmed was the takeover of the Hollywood Gate compound, a centre used by the CIA during the long American war there.
Watching the Afghans was like seeing children let loose in a toy shop, except these toys were killing machines.
The Pentagon itself has admitted that the US left $7.12 billion worth of military equipment in Afghanistan when they left, from guns to military airplanes and helicopters.
Nash’at was able to film all this as the Taliban moved from an insurgency to autocratic rulers but you feel that the animosity to him was omni-present.
This is made explicit when one mujahideen says: “If his intentions are bad, he will die soon,” the image of Ibrahim and his camera reflected in a mirror on a wall.
The film is quite monotone because its lead characters are not given to extremes.
Nash’at was given permission to follow the head of Afghanistan’s Taliban-controlled air force Malawi Mansour, and a lower-ranking Taliban called Mukhtar.
The composure and single-minded intenstity of both is quite chilling.
Hollywoodgate is a film of stares – you actually feel the menace in each of them.
In a rare “human interest” story and the only of a Belfast “slag” a Talib mentions that Mansour has a doctor at home.
Indeed, he is married to a doctor but as Mansour proudly tells his comrades, he told her she would have to give up practicing medicine before he would marry her.
So she did.
Mansour, who has astonishing power,, is also aghat that some young women aren’t covering their faces and decrees that the order must be obeyed.
Mukhtar agrees. Women are like chocolates, he says as he tells the story of a Muslim and an Infidel.
The Musiim has two chocolates. He unwrappred one and threw it on the dirty ground and asks the non-Muslim to eat it.
When he refuses, the Muslim says” An uncovered woman is like an unwrapped chocolate,” he says to the bemused looks of his comrades.
It’s hard then to cheer Mukhtar when he gets into pilot school.
There was also a moment of nostalgia as some Taliban showed off a cave they used to live in while fighting the Americians – and probably the Russians before that.
You wonder if the beautifully shot scenery – more moonscape than landscape – help mould the world view of the Taliban.
However, it is more than the bleak Afghan terrain that has given us the fundamentalism of this group of men, young and old, whose tedious lifestyles are only augmented by periods of extreme violence.
It has to do with Geo-politics – Afghanistan has borders with some of the most volatile countries in the region, including Pakistan and Iran – its purtanical view of their Sunni religion, and of course, its history of invasion, the British invading three times after 1838, the Russians also invaded three times befor the Americans arrived.
But it’s hard to see the Taliban as victims.
During Hollywoodgate, you are always hoping to see a character trait that will help you believe that there is warmth and empathy under the various types of headgear and behind the beards but it never comes.
And these are the individuals who are ruling a nation of over 41 million people.
Being screened at QFT on 22 June as part of Docs Ireland,