They Call It Myanmar: Lifting the Curtain (film)

Wisdom Quarterly; Photosynthesis Prod; NewYorkerFilms; VOA

  

The Saffron Revolution 2007-2012 (R.A.)

This is the story of the most Buddhist country in the world (with 89% of the population as adherents), Burma. 

  

The military coup that took place a half century ago led to the creation of an Orwellian nightmare -- a police state ruled by General Than Shwe and an elite junta of criminal military men, who changed the name of the country to "Myanmar" as they embezzled its wealth, enslaved its people, and aligned with corrupt totalitarian China over corrupt democratic India. 

  

FREE BURMA from police state oppression: Saffron Revolution (gawker.com)

Orwell, who was a colonial British subject born in Burma, wrote 1984 in 1948 with Burma and England in mind.

Told with stunning footage that was shot clandestinely over a two-year period by filmmaker Robert H. Lieberman, the film provides an astonishing and intimate look inside at what has become one of the most isolated countries on the planet. Lieberman lifts the curtain on the everyday life of the people in what was once the Golden Land now held hostage by a brutal and superstitious military regime for 48 years.

Aung San Suu Kyi freedom mural (AFP)

A revealing interview with Nobel Peace Prize winner Lady Aung San Suu Kyi conducted just after her most recent release from house arrest is interwoven with extensive interviews and interactions with Burmese people from all around this incredibly diverse Southeast Asian nation.

  

Burma is the home of the modern emphasis on insight meditation (vipassana) in Buddhist practice thanks to its extraordinary monastic system that has produced such luminaries and scholars as Mahasi Sayadaw and the accomplished Pa Auk Sayadaw.

(Kaye Lin) Burma is going through a transition, reform Associate Producer Harold Dinkins says makes this film more relevant than ever before because the film portrays many sociological aspects in the country from health and education issues to the problem of child labor. It is now screening in select theaters across America.

  

The film, culled from over 120 hours of striking images, is an impressionistic journey that leads viewers across the vastness of Burma. It traces the history of Burma from its beginnings in the ancient city of Pagan (Bagan), through colonial times, the rule of Daw Suu Kyi's father, Aung San, recent uprisings by Theravada Buddhist monks called the Saffron Revolution after the color of their robes, the devastating Cyclone Nargis that killed 150,000 people, up to the present day.

Buddhist monk faces off with police (dvb.no)

During Lieberman's time in Burma he shot video constantly, even though it was forbidden and a risky thing to do in a totalitarian state, which could have led to him being thrown irretrievably into Insein Prison. Now this rare footage forms an unexpected and deeply expressive portrait of a place the world now calls "Myanmar."

Actor Ellen Page explains who dictator Than Shwe  is to Burma

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