TIFF panel

From left: Actor and activist Don Cheadle, producer Cathy Schulman, director Ted Braun and producer Mark Jonathan Harris are at TIFF with the documentary Darfur Now. (Malcolm Taylor/Getty Images)

The Isabel Bader Theatre was an oasis of humility and purpose on Sunday night at a 10-day festival more often distinguished by celebrity hunting, deal making and ego-tripping. A multi-generational, multi-ethnic crowd didn’t turn up to demand autographs from movie stars (though there was one on hand) or find out what Brad Pitt likes to eat (in case you were wondering, the answer is “anything,” according to his friend Don Cheadle). They very sincerely wanted to find out what they can do to stop the conflict in the Darfur region of Sudan, where the government-backed Janjaweed militia has been raping, murdering and displacing villagers and farmers since 2003.

The Time is Now: A Conversation About Darfur was a panel discussion and followup to Ted Braun’s slick and stirring documentary Darfur Now (screened at TIFF), which examines the crisis through the perspective of six individuals connected to the conflict-stricken region in different ways. On the panel with Braun were two of the film’s subjects: activist Adam Sterling, who launched a successful campaign in California to encourage companies to divest themselves of business transactions involving Sudan, and now runs the Genocide Intervention Network; and humanitarian and actor Don Cheadle (Hotel Rwanda). Also on the panel were International Criminal Court chief prosecutor Luis Moreno-Ocampo, who opened the discussion, and Darfur Now producers Cathy Schulman and Mark Jonathan Harris.

The inclusion of the film and discussion is a reflection of the political turn the festival’s programming has taken this year, from big-budget Hollywood projects like In the Valley of Elah and Rendition, with their critical takes on the war in Iraq and the Patriot Act, to a slate of documentaries about repressive regimes and democratic crusaders (A Promise to the Dead, My Enemy’s Enemy, Iron Ladies of Liberia). As part of his introduction, TIFF documentary programmer Thom Powers, who moderated the discussion, said, “Yes, this is a festival to launch big films for the Oscar season. But when you have a film festival, you have a tremendous stage to discuss what’s going on in the world today. And if you don’t use this stage to do this, then what good is this festival?”

That unlikely marriage of celebrity and political advocacy seems particularly pertinent this year, with the presence of superstar activists Brad Pitt and George Clooney. Schulman, who also produced Paul Haggis’s Crash, said that Hollywood “would be remiss if it didn’t use the medium, which reaches more eyes than anything else, for social good.” A low-key Cheadle added that it was his Ocean’s 11 pal Clooney, as well as the tireless efforts of New York Times columnist Nicholas Kristof, who inspired him to get involved in Darfur. “I asked myself, ‘what can I do?’ Then I remembered, right, I’m an actor. I go on red carpets and people stick mikes in my face. As Brad [Pitt] says, ‘We can’t get out of the light and [the people in Darfur] can’t get in the light.’ But I can try to shift that.”

Cheadle is so informed and impassioned that it doesn’t seem quite so absurd when, in Darfur Now, he and Clooney embark on a diplomatic mission to China and Egypt, two of Sudan’s biggest trading partners, to discuss the crisis. Cheadle has enough self-awareness to acknowledge how embarrassing it is that this was the highest-level U.S. delegation to address Egypt on Darfur. But even that’s not as weird as the scene where Cheadle arrives in the office of California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger to lobby him to sign a divestment bill to prohibit public employees’ retirement funds from investing in Sudan. 

“I’m sorry,” Powers said when he asked a question about that moment. “I can’t bring myself to say ‘governor’ and ‘Arnold Schwarzenegger’ in the same sentence.”

“That’s okay,” replied Cheadle. “I’m not sure he can say ‘governor’ either.”

Hejewa Adam is one of a number of Darfuri women fighters trained to battle the Janjaweed militia. She is one of the subjects of the film Darfur Now. (Warner Independent Pictures)

While the mood wasn’t exactly bleak, that’s as funny as the panel discussion got. A group of Canadian students involved in an offshoot of Sterling’s anti-genocide organization were given an ovation. An audience member reminded the Americans in the house that if they want to see justice in Darfur, they need to encourage their government to ratify the agreement that established the International Criminal Court. Advice was swapped on how to connect with others on MySpace and Facebook. When Danny Glover was spotted in his seat, with hand raised politely, he spoke eloquently — if a little long-windedly — about the need to link the crisis in Darfur to other civil conflicts in Africa, as well as environmental issues such as water and food insecurity, and global warming.

The film itself ends optimistically: Sterling and Cheadle shake hands with Schwarzenegger after he signs a divestment bill; truckloads of food are successfully delivered to the hungry; and Ocampo, who has searched for the leaders of the Janjaweed militia with the urgency with which Simon Wiesenthal once hunted Nazis, lays charges against Sudan’s worst war criminals.

But, the panel members said, the situation in Darfur remains grim. Braun fears for the film’s two most vulnerable subjects: Sheikh Ahmed Mohammed Abakar, who keeps peace, allocates meagre resources and offers solace to the grieving at a displaced persons camp; and Hejewa Adam, a once gentle soul turned rebel soldier fighting the Janjaweed, after her son was beaten to death. “The most moving thing for me,” Braun said, “is that they both told me that they were both willing to die to have their stories told. My whole life I’ve worked with stories. This is the first time it’s a matter of life and death.”

More than two million people have been displaced in Darfur, and malnutrition in refugee camps is epidemic, Ocampo told the crowd in Toronto. The Janjaweed continues its raids. One of Ocampo’s witnesses recently reported being forced to watch as her eight-year-old daughter was raped. And in perhaps the most appalling development, the person the Sudanese government has put in charge of overseeing the displaced persons camps and investigating human rights abuses is Ahmad Harun, one of the men charged by the International Criminal Court with committing war crimes.

“The people in Darfur are waiting,” said producer Mark Harris, citing a scene in the film in which a group of female rebel soldiers, all displaced, most survivors of rape, say that when “the white people come to help,” their lives will be better again.

Ocampo echoed the sentiment. “The [world community] needs to hear more voices, different voices, stronger voices, your voices. [In the end,] you have a choice. Are you going to be the person who does something, or the person who does nothing?”

Rachel Giese writes about the arts for CBCNews.ca.

CBC does not endorse and is not responsible for the content of external sites - links will open in new window.

 [an error occurred while processing this directive]