WIW12 Wrap Up

 

Women in the World Summit gathers heavy hitters like Angelina Jolie, Chelsea Clinton to honor activists

Young women are looking beyond Snooki and Kim Kardashian at the real world - and solving its problems

NEW YORK DAILY NEWS

Sunday, March 11, 2012, 6:42 PM

Angelina Jolie at the Women in the World Summit.

Here's hope.

Young women are looking beyond Snooki and Kim Kardashian and their own shoe closets out at the real world and its problems — and solving them. That was the high-energy conclusion of the Women in the World Summit at Lincoln Center Saturday, organized by Newsweek/Daily Beast Editor-in-Chief Tina Brown with a list of guests she alone could gather.

From Angelina Jolie, who opened the three-day event, to U.S. Secretary of State Clinton, who closed, 2,000 attendees met speakers like International Monetary Fund Managing Director Christine Lagarde, former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano, Israeli opposition leader Tsipi Livni, Meryl Streep, Facebook COO Sheryl Sandberg, Madeleine Albright, Gael Garcia Bernal, Kosovo President Atifete Jahjaga, Diane von Furstenberg, Christy (Every Mother Counts) Turlington, Chelsea Clinton, Jenna and Barbara Bush (Global Health Corps) and their cousin, Lauren Bush Lauren (FEED). But it was the courage of women and girl activists from all over the world who blew even these top leaders and philanthropists away.

Women such as Zin Mar Aung, jailed in solitary confinement in Burma for 11 years just for carrying political flyers about Nobel Laureate Aung San Suu Kyi — then, the minute she got out, she started organizing again. And Suma, who was sold in Nepal by her parents at 6 into indentured servitude for six years until an organization called Room to Read helped liberated her. Now, she helps liberate the 20,000 other girls who remain enslaved.

Or Dalia Ziada, who like other Egyptian women walked first into Tahrir Square in front of the men because they thought soldiers wouldn’t touch them — only to be blocked by men from winning office now. She told the room, "There is no spring without flowers; there is no Arab spring without women."

And other activists fighting forced marriage in Pakistan and India, sex slavery in Mexico and even the right to drive in Saudi Arabia. Six months ago, Brown set up the Women in the World Foundation to connect and fund nonprofits helping girls and women around the globe. "What's exciting about this event is that these women come here and get energized by the freedoms that we have here," said Brown, who became a U.S. citizen in 2005. "I think that by showing these women that we care about them, that we support them, either financially or with time, it fortifies them in their struggle."

What these girls are doing could energize a nation. Look at 17-year-old Talia Leman, who is linking companies with kids to raise money for their favorite causes, after raising $10 million for Katrina relief at her website RandomKid.com.

Jessica Matthews and fellow 23-year-old Julia Silverman invented Soccett, a soccer ball which, when kicked, recharges a battery inside to provide two hours of electricity for use in Third World places where there is none.

Lauren Bush Lauren sells bags at her FEED nonprofit that each feed two children in Kenya for a year. Columbia student Julie Zeilinger, 18, raises feminist consciousness on her blog at thefbomb.org. And anti-bullying activist Emily-Anne Rigal, 18, was praised by Lady Gaga for her WeStopHate.org site.

There's Chelsea Clinton, who has helped stop the passage of the HIV virus to newborns in partnership with Mothers2Mothers.org. And another First Daughter, Barbara Bush, whose Global Health Corps sends volunteers to clinics around the world based on the Teach for America model. "Our friends don't care what Kim Kardashian tweets," Jenna Bush, who co-founded Global Health Partners with her sister Barbara, told the Daily News.

"It's a choice," brilliant comedian Tracey Ullman told The News. "You can watch reality shows, or not. I mean, have fun. I heard all the women over there at the charity boutique shopping and saying, 'Aren’t these African bracelets gorgeous?' We love to shop. As Diane von Furstenberg said yesterday, 'Girls will be girls.' Have fun. But then get serious."

jmolloy@nydailynews.com

Loop 21 Covers Women in the World Summit 2012

By Keli Goff
Angelina Jolie, Actress, Director & Goodwill Ambassador, United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees
Loop 21: If there was one piece of advice you could give to everyone here on what they can do to make the world a better place for women, what would it be? 
Angelina Jolie: To listen to the women, because the women have a very strong voice and a very clear voice and women, like the women that were speaking tonight—not myself—but the women who were speaking about their personal experiences…If you listen to them…if you listen to the women in the communities…if you talk to the grandmothers, the teachers, and the daughters…they’ll tell you what they need. They’ll tell you what their children need. They’ll tell you what their communities need and if you listen and do what they ask, the world would be a much better place.

Angelina Jolie, Hillary Clinton and More Women in the World

by The Daily Beast Video Mar 10, 2012 8:41 PM EST 
 

From Nancy Pelosi's chastising Limbaugh to Meryl Streep’s tribute to Hillary Clinton to the Secretary of State herself, watch the best moments from the Women in the World summit. 

 

Angelina Jolie Takes the Stage
Cue the standing ovation: the Hollywood star turned U.N. ambassador read the account of Dr. Hawa Abdi, a 2011 Women in the World delegate who was recently nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize. Abdi has housed thousands of displaced people in her clinic in Somalia since 1983.



Christine Lagarde: If Lehman Brothers Had Been ‘Lehman Sisters’
Maybe she was kidding, maybe she wasn’t. Responding to Niall Ferguson’s question about whether there would have been a financial crisis had more women been in senior positions, Christine Lagarde got the laugh of the first night when she (jokingly?) said “Lehman Sisters” might have avoided default.

Madeleine Albright on Shattering the Glass Ceiling

There’s only one reason there are so few women in power, according to Madeleine Albright: “Men,” she said in one of Thursday evening’s lighter moments.

Nancy Pelosi: Limbaugh Should Be ‘Advertiseless’
What happens now that the talk-radio host is shedding advertisers for his comments over reproductive rights? In the wake of Sandra Fluke’s showdown, the first female majority leader of the U.S. House of Representatives said women shouldn’t have to continue to fight for reproductive rights in this day and age.

Meryl Streep Hails Hillary Clinton
She’s won Oscars and played world leaders, but now she can cross hugging the Secretary of State off her list. Meryl Streep paid tribute to Clinton, praising the Secretary for her tireless work on behalf of women. Bonus: Streep’s latest Oscar hardware made a cameo.

Hillary Clinton: Women Should Be Able to Make Their Own Choices
Why do extremists—in every country—want to control women? The Secretary of State said the U.S. needs to live its own values because “America needs to set an example for the entire world.” Watch Clinton’s rousing call for change. 



The Tiger Mother’s Guide to Life
Firebrand Amy Chua has one piece of advice for Chinese parents—and if you’ve read Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother, it might come as a surprise. The controversial author told the audience that she encourages Asian parents to let their children have sleepovers.





 

Clinton: Let’s ‘Shape Our Destinies’

By Eleanor Clift
 

Taking on extremists both abroad and at home who would marginalize women, the secretary of State called for an “audacious” fight at the Women in the World Summit. By Eleanor Clift

“So how do you like my jacket?” Hillary Clinton asked, as she did a star turn on the stage to show off her green, white, and black jacket with sparkles threaded throughout. It was probably the least likely opening line for Clinton, who is known more for her policy prowess than for any kind of fashion displays. But Oscar-winning actress Meryl Streep had just introduced her, and Streep had twirled around to reveal the back of her red jacket, which was decorated with what looked like pink bow ties.

“I cannot believe what just happened,” Clinton exclaimed, saying she had no idea what Streep would do by way of introduction. Anticipating perhaps a reprise of the actress’s various roles, Clinton pronounced herself relieved that Streep hadn’t made “The Devil Wears Pantsuits,” a reference to Clinton’s tribute to the pantsuits that got her through the presidential race.

Acknowledging that her friends are right when they say she needs more sleep, Clinton stressed that for her what she does is “not so much work as a mission.” She talked about the various brave women she has met over the last 20 years, and when her energy flags, she thinks of all the obstacles they face. She spoke of the relationships she built with women in China, in Belarus, in Ireland, and in Pakistan, and asked, “What does it mean to be a woman in the world?”

“It means never giving up,” she said. “It means getting up, working hard and putting a country, or a community on your back.” She noted how “exquisitely appropriate” she found the picture on the front page of The New York Times that morning of German Chancellor Angela Merkel and IMF managing director Christine Lagarde. “I know both of them, and I think they are worthy of our gratitude and admiration because, boy, do they have hard jobs. Chancellor Merkel is carrying Europe on her shoulders trying to navigate through this economic crisis,” she said.

Joe Neumaier on his chats

People We've Met: Angelina Jolie, James Caan and other stars we spoke to in 2011

Joe Neumaier remembers talks with Michelle Williams, Drake Doremus, Joe Berlinger and more

BY Joe Neumaier
NEW YORK DAILY NEWS

Thursday, December 29 2011, 6:00 AM

Kevin Hagen/Kevin Hagen for the New York Dai

Director Angelina Jolie with Serbian actor Rade Serbedzija, who starred in her film 'In the Land of Blood and Honey.'

Sometimes, when speaking with actors and filmmakers, it’s the more, the merrier. Ideas can bounce around and the topic becomes bigger than just movies — though there’s plenty of that, too.

In March, Keanu Reeves , Vera Farmiga and James Caan sat and discussed their indie dramedy “Henry’s Crime.” The dynamic was fun, with Reeves — a wry guy who uses that “Bill & Ted” baritone to disarm — deferring to the once-and-forever Sonny Corleone on moviemaking matters.

Farmiga’s directorial debut, “Higher Ground,” was creating buzz then, too. But Caan regaled with tales of a life lived large, being box-office gold back in the day and his own directing debut, 1980’s “Hide in Plain Sight.”

In June, Suki Hawley and Michael Galinsky — the filmmakers behind one of the year’s best documentaries, “Battle for Brooklyn” — talked about good and bad changes in the borough they love and live in. Joining them was Daniel Goldstein , one of the most impassioned voices in Hawley and Galinsky’s film about the fight surrounding the Atlantic Yards project.

The first thing Galinsky noticed when we all sat down? That I was holding a coffee from a local deli, not a Starbucks “Venti.”

In early October at the Hamptons Film Festival — an autumnal event that’s one of the most vibrant movie gatherings in New York — I had a series of rambling, hilarious chats with “Like Crazy” director Drake Doremus and the co-star of his thoughtful romantic drama, Anton Yelchin .

Like a pair of goofy, quick-witted brothers who love to be seriously silly, Doremus and Yelchin bounced from topic to topic, from movie to movie: Yelchin’s “Star Trek” role led to ’70s sci-fi which led to Lars von Trier, and on and on. That conversation is surely still going on somewhere.

Also that month, the singularly sensational Michelle Williams had much to say about the golden age of starlets as represented in “My Week with Marilyn”; the importance of Brooklyn to her life and art, and the real magic of movies (she was on a break from re-creating the land of Oz on a soundstage in Detroit). As she heads to what’ll surely be a third Oscar nomination, Williams still appreciates finding her heart’s desire in her own backyard.

In November, I caught up with Joe Berlinger , co-director of the extraordinary “Paradise Lost 3: Purgatory.” His film was instrumental in freeing the men known as the “West Memphis 3,” and he had a lot to say about how movies can bring about change, even if that isn’t the actual intention when the cameras start rolling.

Speaking of change, earlier this month, Angelina Jolie , sitting with the co-star of her directorial debut,“In the Land of Blood and Honey” — veteran character actor Rade Serbedzija — was chatty, smart, sexy and, yes, sweet. The superstar effortlessly segued from what her gripping film means to the Bosnian people to how to get kids thinking about the world.

And a few weeks ago, Metropolitan Ave. in Queens was the setting for a walk-and-talk with writer-director Michael Cuesta , for an upcoming feature on his film “Roadie,” currently on VOD and in theaters Jan. 6.

Cuesta was talking the morning “Homeland” — the Showtime series for which he directed the pilot and finale, among other episodes — was nominated for a slew of Golden Globes. But you’d never know it from his easygoing manner: Cuesta is from Long Island, and is still a local guy. Listening to him discuss the people he makes movies about, it’s clear that homeland, to him, means New York first and foremost.

NY Daily News, The Wrap,

 MvieReview

'In the Land of Blood and Honey'

First-time writer/director Angelina Jolie gives war a face and soul in gripping ‘Land of Blood and Honey’  

NEW YORK DAILY NEWS

Thursday, December 22 2011, 12:25 PM

The intimacy of war — how connected its enemies can feel, the emotional impact each side has on the other — is difficult to portray. It’s the inverse of the usual cinematic approach to battle, which involves tactics and tanks instead of hearts and souls.
The accomplishment, then, of “In the Land of Blood and Honey,” Angelina Jolie’s gripping debut as a writer and director, is not how it dramatizes the division between Serbians and Bosnians once Yugoslavia succumbed to tribal bloodshed after the fall of the Soviet Union. It is how the film never loses sight of the closeness of the combatants, turning national intimacy into a tragic casualty.
In 1992, Ajla (Zana Marjanovic), a Bosnian Muslim painter, leaves her sister and nephew to go to a nightclub, where she meets Danijel (Goran Kostic), a Serbian policeman and Aija’s potential lover.
As they start to flirt and dance, a bomb explodes outside, and the division that has already engulfed Croatia erupts in Sarajevo.
Serb aggressors round up and shoot Bosnian men; the women are sent to camp.
Danijel, whose father (Rade Serbedzija) is a general in the Serbian Army, becomes an officer at one of those camps, where rape and demoralization are weapons of war. He at first attempts to keep Ajla safe, though her fellow war prisoners suffer a more cruel fate.
Later, after Alja escapes and is reunited with her sister, Danijel hears of her whereabouts and sends a patrol to bring her back. He then keeps her in his quarters, where she is able to paint and survive but, also, live in fear of the sadistic soldiers — and of Danijel.
If Alja’s treatment reflects the war’s physical atrocities, Jolie’s portrait of the ethically gray Danijel’s less-than-decent, morally improvised intentions is one of “Blood and Honey’s” representations of the war’s psychic toll.
This is not a love story torn asunder; it is, instead, about the soul of a people split apart.
Jolie’s actors, all from the former Yugoslavia and unknown in the West except for the superb veteran character actor Serbedzija, give magnetic, raw performances. Their commitment helps us through a movie that is often harrowing, never less than intense but important, one unafraid of moments too many have chosen to forget.

Review: Angelina Jolie's Wartime Romeo & Juliet Tale Long on Earnest, Short on Art

Published: December 22, 2011 @ 9:51 am

By Leah Rozen

Thu Dec 22, 2011 12:51pm EST

When actors decide to direct, it’s often a dicey proposition. Some are naturals (Clint Eastwood) but others turn out films that are unwatchable, self-indulgent hokum (anyone else sit through Nicholas Cage’s “Sonny” in 2002?).
So how does Angelina Jolie do with “In the Land of Blood and Honey,” which marks her feature directing-screenwriting debut and landed her on the cover of Newsweek? It’s a respectable first effort, longer on earnestness than art, though much of that is due to her choice of topic material.
“Blood and Honey” is a drama set in Bosnia during and amidst the Bosnian War (1992-95). Jolie is well known for her involvement in global humanitarian causes, and here she takes on the notorious human-rights violations that occurred during the conflict in the former Yugoslavia, including ethnic cleansing, genocide and mass rapes.
She does so through the prism of a complicated love story, one that begins in pre-war Sarajevo. That’s where Danijel (Goran Kostic), a Serbian policeman, and Ajla (Zana Marjonovic), a Bosnian artist, strike sparks while on a first date at a nightclub. As they dance cheek to cheek, their budding romance is interrupted by a bombing, a harbinger of the carnage to come. (The film is in Bosnian, with English subtitles, though Jolie also shot an English-language version.)
Soon, war has broken out and Ajla is among a group of Bosnian women taken prisoner and moved to a military barracks where Danijel is a commander. The women have been brought there to serve as both servants and forced sexual partners for the men.
Danijel takes Ajla under his protection, making clear to his men that she’s off limits to them. The resulting relationship between the two is a fraught mixture of passion and distrust, with neither ever quite sure where the other stands emotionally. It would be impossible, given the brutality and senseless violence going on all around them and their own conflicted loyalties, for it to be otherwise.
More power to Jolie, both for taking on such a demanding subject and for not trying to pretty it up or poeticize it. But the central conceit, a wartime Romeo and Juliet story, around which she has built the movie often seems an awkwardly manufactured device, one that is at odds with the film’s almost documentary-like aspirations.
As a director, Jolie avoids showy angles or camera movements and instead concentrates on telling a story. She displays a solid sense of how to build narrative momentum, though she occasionally lets a scene to stretch on too long to allow an actor an extended moment (a fault shared by many other actors turned first-time directors).
Overall, Jolie has nothing to be embarrassed about and much of which to be proud with this movie. Even in moments where the film doesn’t quite work, she shows ample evidence of ambition and a discerning director’s eye.

Review  ||  by Alison Willmore  ||  12 22 2011 12:30 PM

REVIEW: Angelina Jolie Makes a Bleak Bosnian War Romance with In the Land of Blood and Honey

NY Junket - NY Daily News

 

Kevin Hagen for New York Daily News

Angelina Jolie gets together with Serbian actor Rade Serbedzija, who stars in her movie "The Land of Blood and Honey," during a visit to New York City on Saturday. Dec. 3.

Angelina Jolie’s passion put her behind camera for Bosnian War drama ‘In the Land of Blood and Honey’  

Oscar-winning actress talks about her original story of lovers caught up in 1990s conflict

BY Joe Neumaier
NEW YORK DAILY NEWS

Originally Published: Sunday, December 11 2011, 6:00 AM
Updated: Sunday, December 11 2011, 5:00 PM

Ken Regan

Angelina Jolie on the set of ‘In the Land of Blood and Honey,’ her debut as a feature film writer-director.

Dean Semler

Zana Marjanovic (l) and Goran Kostic play lovers caught up in the Bosnian War of the 1990s.

Kevin Hagen/Kevin Hagen for the New York Dai

Jolie with ‘Blood and Honey’ actor Rade Serbedzija

Ken Regan

Jolie confers with ‘Blood and Honey’ cast members.

“Hi, I’m Angie.”
An understatement, of course, yet perfectly apt for Angelina Jolie as she walks into a room, accessible and upfront.
The Oscar-winning actress can own a place and be just a part of it at the same time. Sitting down with one of the stars of her writing-directing debut, “In the Land of Blood and Honey,” she’s both magnetic and magnanimous.
“Blood and Honey,” opening in New York Dec. 23 and nationwide in January, is a riveting drama set during the genocidal Bosnian War of the 1990s. Ajla (Zana Marjanovic), a Bosnian Muslim woman, is beginning a relationship with Serbian policeman Danijel (Goran Kostic) when the strife encompassing the former Yugoslavia erupts around them.
As Serbs round up and kill Bosnian men and force Bosnian women into camps, where they are systematically raped, Danijel brings Alija to the prison that’s under his command. However, Danijel — whose father (Rade Serbedzija) is a general in the Serbian army — struggles with his loyalties to his homeland, his history and his heart.
The movie is both a far cry from what Jolie’s fans may expect, and yet couldn’t be closer to her heart.
“I never intended to write and direct a film,” Jolie says. “But after going to a lot of countries over 10 years and meeting people post-conflict in places like Afghanistan or Darfur, where the question of intervention comes up, I wanted to express a story [about\] how war changes people.
“It’s not just simply about war. It’s about how human beings break down when surrounded by such ugliness and hate. And how decent people can be broken.”
Jolie, 36, was named a goodwill ambassador with the UN Refugee Agency in 2001. When she isn’t traveling for humanitarian causes, the superstar mother of six sharing her life with another superstar — Brad Pitt — makes films for a global market (“Salt,” “Wanted,” “Mrs. and “Mrs. Smith”) and some on a more personal scale (“A Mighty Heart,” “Beyond Borders”).
As she sits with Serbedzija — the veteran Croatian actor whose stardom in his country includes a successful career as a musician and whose work includes roles in “Mission: Impossible II,” “X-Men: First Class” and on TV’s “24” — Jolie is unfazed from a year of “Blood and Honey.

Just before filming began last year, the Bosnian-Croat culture minister threatened to suspend her filming permit over the movie’s content. Jolie says the objections came from people who hadn’t read the script.
Then Bosnian women’s groups protested the film before being assured it wouldn’t sensationalize the subject matter.
The new offscreen drama is a lawsuit filed by a Croatian journalist in Illinois who claims the film took ideas from a book.
But all of this doesn’t scare a woman who’s not easily intimidated.
Jolie even made the entire movie in both English and the Serbo-Croatian language called BHS. (Every scene was filmed twice, one for each version.) The subtitled version will be released in the U.S.
And, aside from Serbedzija, she hired unknown actors, many of whom experienced the war firsthand.
First off, though, Jolie wants to shoot down the misconception that the movie is “Romeo and Juliet” set in the Balkans.
“This story is the opposite — it’s two people from the same side who are told that they’re different, and cannot be together. ... It’s not a love story. It’s what would have been a love story if not for the war.
“There is a lot of love in it — between a father who, for all his faults, loves his son; between a mother and her child; between sisters — and it’s a love story to a country. But it’s about how war changes and warps us, and makes love impossible.”
Serbedzija, whose career in the West occurred after he and his family fled the Balkans to go to London, was at an event for his music when violence erupted.
“In ’92, I’d gone to Sarajevo’s main square, where 200,000 people had come,” he recalls. “One of my songs, ‘Never Against the Friends I’ve Known,’ was a popular antiwar song after fighting broke out in Croatia a year earlier.
“And I was talking to the crowd when men started shooting from atop a building. Shortly after, we moved to London.” Serbedzija organized several benefit concerts there and in New York, with celebrities raising awareness for refugee issues.
For Jolie, it was her late mother, Marcheline Bertrand, and seeing the world that influenced her sense of advocacy.
“I’m sure a lot of it is from my mom. She brought me to my first Amnesty International dinner when I was a kid,” Jolie says. “So I was raised a bit like that. But it was when I started to travel — the first time I went to a war zone, in Sierra Leone, was over a decade ago — that made me understand what the world is like if you step back and look at it.”
“The world thinks they know Angelina Jolie,” says Serbedzija, who compares her style to Clint Eastwood’s, a filmmaker they’ve both worked with.
“They do not know her at all.”
While her family is the subject of constant media scrutiny, Jolie says the attention she and Pitt receive does have one benefit.
“Sometimes, you just jump into things because you’re compelled to tell a story and learn about a situation,” she says.
“But this is a difficult subject matter to get funded and get made. So if that part of the business that you don’t like helps to get something like ‘In the Land of Blood and Honey’ made, it balances out.”

Read more:

This Week with ABC and others

The main course is on ABC's Nightline on Monday 11:30PM EDT.  This Week with Amanpour on Sunday is just an appetizer.

camanpour Christiane Amanpour

Very moving to talk to Angelina Jolie about the war I covered in Bosnia for Monday's @nightline. Her cast lived through the war.

camanpour Christiane Amanpour

Angelina told me she chose this as her directing debut to show dangers of turning away from genocide, see a preview tomorrow on This Week

 

Matt_Mazur Matt Mazur

The last 48 hours have been rather intense & at moments exhilarating, but the next 48 hours are going to truly put me through the gauntlet.

 

NadiaNeophytou Nadia Neophytou

Just came out of In the Land of Blood&Honey. Can't quite explain how I feel. Physically ill. Heavy-hearted. Need to sit with it a little
Was my initial reaction. It's a deeply affecting, powerful film RT @NadiaNeophytou physically ill is never good. Was it that raw?

akstanwyck Anne Thompson

RT @TheTinaBeast: The stunning Angelina Jolie lights up the Newsweek cover this week pic.twitter.com/z3zp8lB3

akstanwyck Anne Thompson

RT @FilmmakerMag: I couldn't get an interview with Angelina Jolie, but she's on Christianne Amanpour right now talking about her new film.

FilmmakerMag Scott Macaulay

Huh. I couldn't get an interview with Angelina Jolie, but she's on Crhistianne Amanpour right now talking about her new film.

 

CineKink CineKink

@FilmmakerMag Well, did you promise her a chance to also talk about "husband Brad Pitt and their six children"? Yeesh.

FilmmakerMag Scott Macaulay

@CineKink She's not doing celeb interview for the new movie. 60 Minutes, Amanpour, all about Bosnian refugees, the war, etc.

CineKink CineKink

@FilmmakerMag Amanpour's outro pitch for the morning show included the mention of Brad, etc. I was surprised, didn't match previous tone.

FilmmakerMag Scott Macaulay

@CineKink Oh, got it. I turned it off by that point. As the opening approaches, I'm sure the pitches will drift more towards the celeb.

 

rjgrace R. Jeffrey Grace

You can't copyright facts. RTsAngelina Jolie sued

Kevin Hagen for New York Daily News

Angelina Jolie gets together with Serbian actor Rade Serbedzija, who stars in her movie "The Land of Blood and Honey," during a visit to New York City on Saturday.

Dec 4, 2011 12:40pm

Angelina Jolie Steps Behind the Camera ‘In the Land of Blood and Honey’

 

ABC

ABC News’ Imtiyaz Delawala reports:

Academy Award-winning actress Angelina Jolie often tackles violence and war in her action films.
But her latest film, “In the Land of Blood and Honey,” she tackles it in entirely different way, delving into the lives of innocent people caught in the middle of the war in Bosnia in the 1990′s.
For the first time, Jolie stepped behind the camera, writing and directing the film that examines the Bosnian conflict through the eyes of characters witnessing the systematic violence and genocide that enveloped the region for more than three years.
“I was thinking and meditating on these international themes of violence against women, lack of intervention, and how human beings are changed and warped by war, and how some people come out stronger and some people are truly broken,” Jolie told “This Week” anchor Christiane Amanpour, who covered the conflict in the 1990′s. “There’s no safe way to tackle these subject matters, but I think the important thing is to discuss them and tackle them.”
While the United States was heavily involved and finally ended the Bosnian conflict in 1995, the war that raged for more than three years in the heart of Europe was considered one of the greatest collective failure of international diplomacy since World War II.
“It’s infuriating how long it took to intervene,” Jolie said of the conflict. “When I say ‘intervene,’ I don’t mean always boots on the ground, I don’t mean that. It’s just being conscious, discussing it, not hiding the issues, and figuring out and working towards solutions with the people on the ground.”
While Jolie is a Hollywood star known more for her high-profile film roles and her relationship and family with actor Brad Pitt, she says those who know her well know that tackling such as serious subject matter as the Bosnian war is not out of character.
Jolie serves as a Goodwill ambassador to the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, and is a member of the Council on Foreign Relations.
Jolie did extensive research for “In the Land of Blood and Honey,” pouring through articles and photos to try to capture individual stories from the conflict.
“There’s a great photograph that I had in the office,” Jolie said, describing a photo of a woman. “She’s got the pearls, and she’s dressed. And she’s done her hair. And it’s just, you may shoot at me, but you will not remove my humanity, my dignity, my self, my person. I am going to continue to keep my head up.”
When casting the film, Jolie decided to turn to local actors who lived through the war, on all sides of the ethnic divides.
“I would not have done the film without them,” Jolie said. “It belongs to them, it’s their story.”
Actresses Zana Marjanovic and Vanessa Glodjo said they were moved by the script written by Jolie, which they said didn’t soften the conflict as many films do.
“When I read the script, it was — I had knives in my chest, in my stomach,” Glodjo said. “And I said, ‘My God. What is this? What is this really? It’s so strong.’”
Both actresses said they hope the film serves as a reminder of what happened during the Bosnian conflict, and the physical and emotional destruction of the war.
“Our fear is the silence. Our fear is ignorance. Our fear is that people won’t know what happened,” Marjanovic said. “And being ignorant about what happened leaves a chance that it may happen again.”
Jolie said she was “very moved” by her experience making the film, and said she hopes it conveys the people of the region well.
“There is something in this film we hope through the music, through the people, through the relationships, that also shows the warmth and the love, and the humor, and the life of the people from this part of the world that is special,” Jolie said.