The Bagdad Taxi, a documentary movie directed by Frederic Tonnoli sends chills down the spine of everyone who watches it, at least mine had chills. The setting of the film was months after the end of the tenure of the American troops in Iraq. The movie revolves around a filmmaker who sojourns the country of Iraq right from one far end to the other, in a taxi with Khalid, who doubled as both his friend and a cab driver. The journey covered over ten Iraqi towns with a good number of over a hundred police checks, as the filmmaker would put it. The religious war present in the country has the sub-religions present in Islam i.e. the Kurds, Shia and the Sunnis as the actors who rarely are at a consensus with one another. The religious war is a severe plague that has claimed lives of many in the country, including the Christians who have been implicated at one point or the other.
It is essential at this point to hit the road into the tragedy of Iraq beginning with Erbil. Erbil is a town that is deemed to be much better compared to others given the peace and the economic stability that is present in the city. It is the home to the Kurdistan. A member of the parliament of the Kurds was the first passenger that boards the taxi. He affirmed the myth that oil was a curse in Iraq owing to the times of Saddam Hussein’s tenure as the Iraqi president. On a brighter note, though, the revenues gained from the oil were used to refurbish the infrastructure in the country. Sulaymaniyah was the next stop where a passenger was picked. The passenger was out to offer tribute to the members of his village who were massacred because of the quest for independence for the Kurdish people. Saddam planned the massacre and the killings were facilitated by the use of toxic gasses being released to the natives of Sulaymaniyah.
The next stop was after going through the dangerous road to Kirkuk, a former Kurdish hub. The road was previously under the control of terrorist groups including Al Qaeda. It was in Kirkuk where another passenger came on board, this time round, a Kurd, a friendly one. The city was perceived to be very dangerous given the experience of the next passenger, a lady who at the filming timed owned a private school in the town. She mentioned of the phone call she received from a terrorist requesting for money after word went out concerning the promotion of the school. This resulted in the newly incepted school to be closed down for a month before resuming operations after having a change of heart.
The next town that was sojourned was the city referred by the filmmaker as being a dead town was Mosul. It is in this city that Ahmed, a law student popped into the taxi. The student narrated of his dream to live in a peaceful Iraq, the old Mesopotamia. It was saddening that military protection was in the town, including the mosques showing that peace was not prevailing per se. The taxi driver was perturbed that Iraq was rich with the black gold when in fact the citizens lacked the commodity plus gas. In Tikrit’s outskirts, the taxi driver plus the filmmaker got arrested by the police and were summoned to a house arrest for hours. After release, they proceeded with the journey inside Tikrit where a journalist got on board. Fadhil had lost his best friend, a reporter, through a planned assassination. He argued that the killing of the best individuals in the society was done for monetary purposes and not religious reasons as regularly explained. Saddam’s operations were centered in Tikrit, and it was the same town where he was captured. It was also evident that the black market for oil in Iraq was spearheaded by the big shots of the government.
Fallujah was the next stop, and it’s renowned for kidnapping cases for profit purposes. Fallujah was one of the key areas that received armed operations from the Americans during the great battle in the town where over 4000 civilians died. Uranium powered weapons were employed during the battle, and the people blamed Bush’s administration and the Americans for the calamity. Children were as a result born genetically disfigured which was worrying with the saddest part being that mothers abandoned their disfigured babies in the hospitals. The records were well clear during the stop to the health facility, and the numbers of the deformed children were noted to be on the rise.
Bagdad was the next pit stop and temporary peace characterized it. The town once erected a statue of Saddam, which was demolished almost a decade ago. Men in khaki uniform were a common place in the town. The next passenger was a theatrical professional who was exiled in France because he was banned from Iraq but he hopes that he would reach masses through theater. He argued that the people in Iraq, Bagdad precisely, appeared to be lost with the terrorists in the region fighting amongst each other injuring civilians, for money. Christians are deemed to be affiliated to the Westerners. In Bagdad, a Shia woman who was a passenger in the taxi was married to a Sunni man, a marriage union that is unheard of today.
The road to Babylon commenced; next, a town where Saddam believed he was the king and he, in fact, had a palace built in the city. Karbala city was; next, here, a narrator argued that Al Qaeda was to blame for the unrest in Iraq. Pilgrimage is conducted here by the Shia’s. Untrustworthiness in families is evident because of the religious divide, so mentioned a narrator. Shia martyrs were commemorated by portraits displayed on the streets. A narrator who previously served in the army argued the misery that was present in the Iraqi army was so much that he retreated after seven years in service. Moving on, the road to Basra was the second last stop. A narrator mentioned that life was much better while under the presidency of Saddam. The natives were hopeless and unemployed with full of disgust and shunned for the administration. The curse of the black oil was believed to have weighed a toll on the natives who are wretched with the current situation in Iraq. The journey ended in Al Fao, a town under strong military presence and where the monies from oil are transferred inwards and outwards. Al Fao was noted to be a common place for war.
The above documentary is a sad narration of the bondage that the people of Iraq are in yet with no chains in their arms. The striking part was the disfigured tots who knew no war but are much conversant with its aftermath. The men in uniform are present roaming around the country from Erbil to Bagdad and Basra, to watch out for any mishap in the society, but their watch is not enough given the assassinations that are still ongoing. The melancholy in the voices of the narrators in the film is disheartening, and it seems like some of the locals have lost hope. On the brighter side, though, there are those still have hope for a peaceful Mesopotamia, like the Law student back in Mosul. (Retrieved from YouTube)
Works Cited
Tonnoli, Frederic. Bagdad Taxi. (2012). Retrieved on 22/07/2016 from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9_VmW563JXw&spfreload=10
