Effective doc will inspire grass-roots activists

Winner of the Best Documentary award at this year’s Tribeca Film Festival, Pray the Devil Back to Hell tells how a small group of Liberian women brought peace to their war-torn, west-African nation. Their remarkable achievement hasn’t received the attention it deserves and an experienced group of women filmmakers from America rectifies the situation without overlaying the story with an excessive amount of information. While it leaves many questions unanswered, the film should inspire other grass-roots activists as it expands over the next two months in big metropolitan markets. Divine intervention will be necessary for it to break out and do major business, however.

Seasoned documentarian Gini Reticker and her producer Abigail Disney let six of the movement’s leaders do all the talking. Following a title sequence that employs colorful drawings and a beautiful song performed by Angelique Kidjo, we begin to hear their gripping testimony. By 2002, they were fed up with the civil war that had begun in 1989 and which now pitted dictator Charles Taylor against rebel forces led by a coalition of warlords. It had cost the lives of at least 200,000 Liberians. All the familiar ingredients were present—ethnic and economic strife, competition for natural resources and the conscription of children. One emblematic story told concerns a woman forced to sing, clap and dance while watching her husband get his throat cut and her 12-year-old daughter get raped.

Although the origins and conduct of the war were similar to many conflicts on the continent in recent decades, how it was dealt with is truly unique. As rebel forces closed in on the capital of Monrovia, Taylor’s stronghold, and as conditions in refugee camps on the outskirts of the city became intolerable, Christian and Muslim women “desperate for peace” sprang into action. Donning white T-shirts, they launched a series of peaceful protests during which they prayed and fasted at the city’s central fish market.

Leaders of the ecumenical effort—namely, Leymah Gbowee, Etweda “Sugars” Cooper, Etty Weah, and Vaiba Flomo—eloquently recount how they used whatever means they could think of to get the men of the country to stop fighting, including a sex strike. They called on their imams, priests and bishops to pressure rebel leaders, who were predominantly Muslims, and Taylor, a Christian. Journalist Janet Johnson Bryant was able to publicize their efforts through the country’s Catholic radio station. Police officer Asatu Bah Kenneth—currently Liberia’s deputy chief of police—mobilized Muslim women and was able to provide vital logistical information that made the protests more effective.

Soon, Taylor was forced to acknowledge the movement and after meeting with its representatives agreed to attend peace talks with the opposition in Ghana. When the talks stalled, a group of around 200 women who had traveled to Ghana kept up the pressure even at one crucial point blocking the meeting hall and forcing both sides to remain until an accord was reached. After the agreement was signed, Taylor was indicted by a war crimes tribunal in Sierra Leone and eventually exiled to Nigeria.

Along with first-person testimony, Pray the Devil Back to Hell uses file footage and a handful of news reports to chronicle events. It could benefit from more detail—for instance, material that reveals what the rest of the population thought about these brave women and how they made their “crazy dream of peace” a reality. Then again, maybe all one really needs to know is that in January 2006 Madam Ellen Johnson Sirleaf was elected president of Liberia, Africa’s first female head of state.

Distributor: Balcony Releasing
Director: Virginia Reticker
Producer: Abigail E. Disney
Genre: Documentary
Rating: Unrated
Running time: 72 min.
Release date: November 7 NY, November 14 LA