The Road to Redemption

The award-winning documentary filmmaker Jonathan Stack still can't seem to let go of Liberia, a country that has been torn by years of civil war. The point of departure of his new documentary short is the novel Redemption Road by Elma Shaw, a Liberian woman who immigrated to the United States and put the thoughts of women survivors of the civil war down on paper. These feelings consist of guilt, shame and the will to survive. Shaw doesn't appear in the film herself, but reads passages from her book aloud and introduces us to her character Bendu, a woman who isn't ready to forget despite society's insistence that she do so. The film also gives the floor to a number of real women who formed the inspiration for Shaw's story. Women who were raped, watched their families get murdered, and were forced to take up arms themselves. Women who now, despite it all, want to rebuild their society and deal with their traumas. But if they are ever to achieve redemption, they will have to talk about the past. Previously, Jonathan Stack made the striking documentary Liberia: An Uncivil War, which won the Special Jury Award at IDFA in 2004. He also produced Iron Ladies of Liberia (2007), about Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf, the first woman to be elected president. (International Documentary Film Festival Amsterdam)