MOVIE REVIEW: A Better Life Without the King

They have Coca Cola. They have great palaces. They have a rapping princess. They have a great tradition that they have reclaimed once they gained independence from Great Britain.

The king has been visited by Nelson Mandela, Prince Charles and Michael Jackson--great honors for a landlocked country about the size of New Jersey, located in Southern Africa.

A largely Christian nation (40 percent Zionist--a combination between Christianity and native beliefs--and 20 percent Catholic according to the CIA Factbook), Swaziland is also plagued by deep poverty and HIV/AIDS. The estimated life expectancy is 31.7 for men and 32 for women. It has the world's highest HIV/AIDS rate in the world, resulting in high infant mortality rates and low life expectancy.

The world's last absolute monarch, King Mswati III, is the king of the title of Michael Skolnik's grainy but thought-provoking 2007 documentary, Without the King. There are no princes in this film although we know that his eldest daughter, Sikhanyiso, has a brother.

We are introduced to Mswati III on his coronation day. He is 18, handsome and shy. The year is 1986. He was the second of 67 sons; his father had 70 wives at the time of his death in 1982. Mswati III was educated in England at the Sherborne School. From 1983 until his coronation, two of his late father's wives served as regent.

In comparison to his late father, he has a modest number of wives: 13. His first two have sons but none of them, according to tradition, can become king.

Sikhanyiso is the eldest daughter of his third wife who married Mswati when she was 16. She is a college student in California and although we see her in the movie, we do not see her elder half brothers or her brother. It is unlikely that she would replace Mswati III as some reviewers have projected.

She is seen as a rebel princess, a title that she also mentions in the documentary. Tradition requires that a special counsel choose a wife and the crown prince. How will she be able to serve her country under another half-sibling's rule? We don't know.

Footage of Sikhanyiso, her mother and Mswati III are intercut with scenes of poverty, and angry protesters who say they will prevail against tear gas and bullets.

She does mention the king's solution to the HIV/AIDS crisis--a five year ban on sex for women under the age of 21. The ban was ended a year early and did nothing to stop the rate of HIV/AIDS infection. During that time, the king took another wife under the age of 21.

As a woman comments, it's hard to contain HIV/AIDS when "they look at him...why does the king continue...taking more wives" and feel that they can take more wives.

The documentary touches on the discomfort of a daughter whose father marries a woman younger than her but we do not see this new bride. The documentary doesn't mention how two of Mswati's wives have left him. That would have made interesting commentary.

The documentary does touch on accusations of forcing young girls to marry him and Sikhanyiso comments,"...a lot of the girls want to be there anyways."

Of course they do. Poverty and HIV/AIDS on one side and extravagant luxury on the other side? What kind of choice is the culture giving women?

Both Sikhanyiso and her mother touch on the paranoia that exists, accusations of murder attempts and threats, in a world where there is little future and prosperity outside of the royal family and who becomes the next king will have a great deal of control. One wonders if the many children--cousins and half-brothers and sisters of the current king also live in luxury or have fallen on hard times.

While the documentary ends with Sikhanyiso lamenting how the government has money but has deserted a small village, saying that her country will "turn around" in "her time" is hopeful and somewhat misleading.

She is 18. Her father is in his forties. She has brothers and uncles to contend with. Her father, once a bashful youth making his first public speech has grown soft and self-indulgent--a quality that Sikhanyiso seems to share in her view of a king and his responsibilities. At least she doesn't say something like let them eat cake.

In the end, this documentary glosses over some issues to emphasize the HIV/AIDS crisis and poverty, but stands as strong commentary against monarchy and polygamy.

MOVIE REVIEW: Five Times in Turkey Shows Teen Angst

The wind. The sound of leaves. A boy sitting outside a window whom we first see from the back. The minaret. Trees.

If you're looking for harems, terrorists, drugs, belly dancing or people speaking in exotic accents and acting like bimbos or buffoons, this isn't the movie. If you want to see how three young teens deal with their life and hardships in a small town, this is a beautiful, subtle movie worth seeking out.

The 2006 Turkish movie, Bes Vakit, meaning Times Five or Five Times, won a best film award at the Istanbul International Film Festival as well as a Firpresci prize for director/writer Reha Erdem.

Called Times and Winds in English and shown with subtitles, the movie shows the unhappy lives of three young teens in a small, impoverished Turkish village. Omer (Ozkan Ozen) is the son of an iman. The iman is the man looking out the window at Omer. He is sick and sends his son off to get his brother to do the nightly call to prayer. Omer's father favors Omer's younger brother and Omer dreams of killing his father, but not his brother.

His friend Yakup (Ali Bey Kayali) has a secret crush on the young school teacher.He learns that he is not the only one who admire her beauty. Yildiz (Elit Iscan) tries to balance her schoolwork and caring for her infant brother. She adores her father, in a manner that is bound to disappoint.

There is nothing remotely close to what we could call closure. There is no climax or resolution. Like life, loose strings remain untied. Like many disaffected teens, their faces are mostly expressionless. Arvo Part's score provides an emotional guide.

Erdem shows us the beauty of the high rocky mountains that overlook the sea. We see the beautiful trees, hear the rustling of the winds. The skies are blue and all this might seem gorgeous, but in the foreground we see poverty, the cruelty of a man's indifference to his eldest son's feelings--not only with Omer, but with another set of brothers as well. The villagers show charity toward an old woman, toward the young teacher (Selma Ergec) and toward an orphan (Tarik Sonmez).

The boys laugh when they see animals copulating, but there's something wrong when they realize Yildiz also sees the animals and drive her away.

Five times refers to the number of times, the Muslim faithful are called to prayer, but five also resonates in other ways in Muslim life. A true believer follows the so-called five pillars of Muslim life: faith, daily prayers, concern for the needy, self-purification through fasting and a pilgrimage.

Erdem divides the movie into five parts, beginning in reverse order, evening until we end in morning. The trees and the wind seem to be characters in this scenic, lyrical movie as does the minaret which is sometimes framed in the background. The romance of the country, including the exotic foreign country, has been pared down to a spare portrayal of children caught between their desires and the tyranny of their parents. Yet their parents aren't evil; they are casually cruel, as easily as people from any other place and in any other culture.

Times and Winds reminds us of how lucky we are as Americans and yet, how very much similar we are to people in a small Turkish village, even if they are Muslim.