I Want to Live

To my mind, it is a fully realized cinematic work of art, a film that has been carefully composed in every single scene in order to provide a unique and meditative, but powerful watching experience. Without doubt, any viewer with an open heart and mind will be fully immersed into the world and lives of the young children portrayed in this movie.

If you watch the news on daily basis, I'm sure you will see some news about the Kurdish people and their fight against ISIS, there are also many documentaries on the subject, and I have seen many of them, but I have noticed many of these documentaries only give the big picture, they talk about the politic, give number, geographical location, etc. What i loved about this documentary and found it so interesting is how the director take the viewer inside the refugees camp, give a glimpse of what is like to be a refugee, to be a Kurdish refugee, and more than a politic, the film is about the daily life of refugees, their need which are simple, but they are incapable of having, the boy is sick and want to be cured, but the problem is he cannot find treatment where he is, his need is to have a good health, a house, a roof over his head, protected from the heat and from the cold, simple needs. While watching the films I was reminded of the great Italian Neo-realism cinema of 40s and 50s, it is realistic and poetic at the same time.

I came upon watching this film by chance after I started my MA thesis on the Kurdish Struggle for Independent, out of the dozen documentaries that I have watched so far on the Kurdish issue and Kurdistan, this one is by far the best, especially when it comes to tacking the issue of Kurdish refugees and the Kurdish struggle in Rojava and their fight against ISIS, what I liked about the film is how simple it is; the filmmaker show everything from the perspective of the little boy, what he see and hear, we see and hear, we hear his wishes for a peaceful future, end of war, the right to study, read and write in Kurdish in school, for the Kurds to rule themselves, and unification of all four part of Kurdistan, these are in term of his political wish, but the film is not a political film, it is a about the live of a boy who is sick and wish to have a good health and get a treatment for his sickness, only this boy happen to be a Kurd, who live in a Refugee camps and cannot find this treatment. That is the richness of this film, it work on many levels and rich in term or narrative, but simple and beautiful like all works of Arts should be.

This film was shown at the Anthology Film Archives here in New York presented by Jonas Mekas himself, fore more than 1 hour and 40 minutes everyone in the theater was quite, what is great and beautiful about this film is the simplicity of it, the composition of the shot are beautiful, the camera never move, except when it is inside a car or a motorcycle, the sound is very rich, and pace is slow, the filmmaker show the films as if from the POV of a refuge in the camp seeing everything, because of that everything is presented as it is, the editing, use of Music and the voice over are simple and not intended for manipulation, just 1 hour and 40 minute in the live of a little boy who only has one wish and that is to live as the title suggest, rather a simple wish, but hard for him because he is sick and must get treatment before it is too late.

Be warned, much of the footage is shot on location, very realistic, not your Disney type films, it show the daily life and struggle of a little boy who is a Refugee and also sick. If the world understands what's happened over there, we might be a little more compassionate for the people who suffered through this, especially the children. There's still time left to do something, something for the children and their cries for help.