They Call it Myanmar: Lifting the Curtain

Filmmaker Robert H. Lieberman's documentary offers an enlightening portrait of Myanmar—formerly known as Burma—moving beyond the basic headlines/soundbites about an Asian dictatorship that kept reformist and Nobel Peace prize-winner Aung San Suu Kyi under high-profile house arrest for decades. Elegantly shuttling back forth between Myanmar's epic past and post-colonial present, Lieberman depicts a police state with some impressive contradictions. Devout Buddhism (brought by a hero-king of old from nearby Sri Lanka) helps inhabitants accept misfortune (peasants subsist in dire poverty, daily pawning the pots in which they cook their food), yet Buddhist monks are often in the forefront of protest against a brutal regime. Myanmar's military autocracy is rather unique, since it features no Big Brother-figure strongman, just a blundering series of blindly obedient generals who come and go in distressingly smooth succession, although the 1990 success at the polls for Suu Kyi's party—the National League for Democracy—coupled with her much-publicized arrest (she was released in late 2010) have brought hope for change to a younger generation. Despite some official meddling in his inquiries, Lieberman captures the country's splendor (the regime certainly doesn't discourage tourism dollars) and refreshing human elements, such as the interviewee who will not discuss politics but does bemoan that martial-law lockdown restricts access to his favorite import, Perry Mason. DVD extras include deleted scenes and footage of Suu Kyi accepting the Nobel prize. Recommended. Aud: C, P. (C. Cassady)