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I usually love the Olympics, but I have found these games difficult to watch. Whether it was the cynical use of a Uighur torchbearer by the Chinese, or that Russia seemed to be biding its time until after the final ceremonies before invading Ukraine, there was something rotten about these games, or at least the geopolitics of these games. No number of skier aerials can compensate for watching an authoritarian regime thumb its nose at the once robust liberal world order. Every night, I take in a few minutes of highlights but soon find myself reaching for the remote. So one night I recently found myself watching The Will to See, a new documentary by Bernard-Henri Lévy. It was remarkable to see a film so out of step with the times.
[time-brightcove not-tgx=”true”]
Over the course of four decades Lévy has made a name for himself traversing the globe in an effort to turn the world’s attention to forgotten conflicts, humanitarian crises, and—his critics would say—himself. Nearly halfway into his documentary, which is a tour of conflicts that have fallen from the headlines, Lévy and his crew visit a Somali medical dispensary near al-Shabaab held territory. As he readies for this visit, which is arranged through a group of private security contractors, Lévy receives some rudimentary training on how to self-administer a tourniquet in case of ambush. When Lévy arrives at the dispensary, he doesn’t wear this tourniquet on his gear—as a soldier might—because he has no gear. Instead, he wears it on his arm in the way one might wear a mourning band. As he mixes among the Somalis, a woman confronts him. She says, “I don’t have money but please take me with you.” To which Lévy replies, “My team is here for you, to inform.”
But he is not a doctor, nor are the members of his team. What might he inform this woman about? And, as if to prove he is not a doctor, in the very next scene we see him in front of a crowd of children who are all laughing while Levy is joking around and…
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Source : time
