Don’t you?

After watching the preview, I’m more eager than ever to find out what happens to these young people. From the Kickstarter page description:

For the first time a film gives a voice to Sudanese youth from different origins, Muslims and Christians. The Waiting Room is an intimate portrait of a society that remains unknown to most and misunderstood by many. It addresses contemporary issues of identity and religion which continue to shape the world we live in.

Maybe you’ve donated to causes for Darfur, but wouldn’t you like to know what it’s really like to live in Sudan? A lot of political decisions are being made by our governments about Sudan, but we still know so little about the people who live there.

In light of the United Nations summit on the Millenium Development goals starting this week, stories like the one Alexandra Sicotte-Levesque presents here are more important than ever. Amidst the heady rhetoric and plaintive calls to Do The Right Thing (which is more complicated than it should be), the human, real stories like the ones presented in Sicotte-Levesque’s film seem to get lost. And they shouldn’t. The MDGs are about people, after all -not statistics.

And statistics -of the glammy kind -are really all I’ve heard about when it comes to films lately. There’s something seriously refreshing for me to come upon a movie (make that, movie-in-the-making) like this after two solid weeks of non-stop glitzy TIFF coverage. Dear wag-tongued media, please, no more frock-and-name-dropping stories. I don’t mind the odd bit of fun, but the omnipotent wall of Glamazonian coverage lately has been like eating a steady diet of icing.

In truth, there were a whack of great, socially relevant films at the film fest this year -and hey, one of ’em won the People’s Choice Award (kudos, NFB & Mr. Suzuki!). I hope The Waiting Room will be among the lot at a future TIFF. Fingers crossed.