Backstabbing for beginners
| Movie | |
|---|---|
| German title | Backstabbing for beginners |
| Original title | Backstabbing for beginners |
| Country of production | Denmark , Canada , USA |
| original language | English |
| Publishing year | 2017 |
| length | 108 minutes |
| Rod | |
| Director | By fly |
| script | Per Fly, Daniel Pyne |
| production |
Daniel Bekerman , Malene Blenkov , Lars Knudsen , Nikolaj Vibe Michelsen , Jay Van Hoy |
| music | Todor Kobakov |
| camera | Brendan Steacy |
| cut |
Susan Shipton , Morten Giese , Janus Billeskov Jansen |
| occupation | |
| |
Backstabbing for Beginners is a political thriller by Per Fly that was released in Danish cinemas on January 18, 2018 and in US cinemas on April 27, 2018. The film is based on the memoirs of Michael Soussan .
action
The young idealist Michael Soussan lands his dream job in the late 1990s as coordinator of the United Nations Oil-for-Food program . He has wanted to work for the UN since he was a child, and now he is immediately entrusted with the organization's highest budget program. In war-torn Iraq, he is supposed to control the oil reserves and the program that is vital for the civilian population, as economic sanctions have been imposed on their country. Political conflicts of a different kind are being waged in the country after the Iraq war. Nations hungry for power, represented by emissaries, are waging an extraordinarily shady struggle for the country's resources.
Pasha, the do-gooder's new manager, is a diplomat and has to teach the newcomer how the system works. Soussan is quickly driven out of his naivety and trustworthiness, and he is made aware of a high-level conspiracy.
The oil-for-food program
The Oil-for-Food Program (OFFP) was proposed in 1995 by the US administration under Bill Clinton to counter the allegation that the civilian population in Iraq in particular was suffering from economic sanctions against the Country. These were imposed as a result of the Second Gulf War and were intended to disarm Saddam Hussein and Iraq and enable the country to exchange oil for humanitarian goods, in particular food and medicine, on the world market.
Due to allegations of corruption, Kofi Annan set up an independent commission of inquiry in 2004 under the leadership of Paul Volcker and the other commission members Richard Goldstone and Mark Pieth . In its final report, the so-called Volcker Commission states that outside the OFFP, Iraq was able to sell oil illegally for almost eleven billion US dollars and that a large number of internationally active companies received kickbacks amounting to 1.8 billion US dollars Iraqi government paid. For this reason, the OFFP is considered to be one of the largest known corruption cases in the last few decades.
Former UN staff member Michael Soussan wrote the book Backstabbing for Beginners: My Crash Course in International Diplomacy about his time in Iraq, working for the oil-for-food program, in which he acted as a whistleblower .
production
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Directed by Per Fly , who together with Daniel Pyne also adapted Soussan's memoir for the film. For the first time Fly directed an official Danish-Canadian co-production and made an English-language feature film with an international cast for the first time.
After Josh Hutcherson was originally supposed to take on the role of Michael Soussan, he was later replaced by Theo James . Ben Kingsley took on the role of his manager Pasha and also served as one of the film's executive producers. Jacqueline Bisset plays Christina Dupre.
The shooting began on February 25, 2016 in Marrakech , from the end of March 2016 the shooting took place in Toronto , later in Copenhagen and ended on April 15, 2016.
The score was composed by Todor Kobakov . The soundtrack for the film was released on April 27, 2018.
The film was shown at the Nordic Film Days Lübeck at the beginning of November 2017 . It was released in Danish cinemas on January 18, 2018. A24 and DirecTV secured the distribution rights for the USA . A theatrical release in the USA took place on April 27, 2018.
reception
Age rating
In the USA, the film received an R rating from the MPAA , which corresponds to a rating of 17 and over.
Reviews
Overall, the film received mixed feedback from the critics.
Jessica Kiang from Variety calls Backstabbing for Beginners an elegantly shot film that provides a convincing impression of the compromises and corruption of international aid organizations and the compromised, corrupt, but not necessarily evil people who run them.
Web links
- Backstabbing for Beginners in the Internet Movie Database (English)
- Information about the film at Det Danske Filminstitut (Danish)
- Backstabbing for Beginners - Official Trailer from A24 on Youtube (Video, English)
Individual evidence
- ^ Lutz Oette: The Development of the Oil for Food Program and the Current Humanitarian Situation in Iraq In: Max Planck Institute for Comparative Public Law and International Law. 1999.
- ↑ Georg Mascolo: "Oil for Food" - nightmare of a world authority In. Spiegel Online, November 17, 2004.
- ↑ http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/shared/bsp/hi/pdfs/08_09_05_volume2.pdf
- ↑ http://variety.com/2016/film/global/goteborg-danish-director-follow-the-money-1201695143/
- ↑ - ( Memento of the original from October 28, 2015 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.
- ↑ https://thetheologians.net/principal-photography-commences-on-backstabbing-for-beginners-c58f63eccd03?gi=e91139c19454
- ↑ https://www.onlocationvacations.com/2016/03/31/backstabbing-beginners-starring-theo-james-begins-filming-toronto/
- ↑ Sumita Ganguly: Theo James Starts Filming Thriller 'Backstabbing for Beginners' in Toronto In: movienewsguide.com, April 5, 2016.
- ↑ https://thetheologians.net/director-per-fly-wraps-backstabbing-for-beginners-d1da918b2ec1
- ↑ Todor Kobakov Scoring Per Fly's 'Backstabbing for Beginners' In: /filmmusicreporter.com, January 5, 2017.
- ↑ http://www.luebeck.de/filmtage/de/programm/movie/view/2017/8631.html
- ↑ http://www.dfi.dk/ factaomfilm/film/da/96141.aspx?id= 96141
- ↑ http://variety.com/2017/film/news/theo-james-backstabbing-for-beginners-a24-directv-1202457704/
- ↑ https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/backstabbing_for_beginners
- ↑ http://variety.com/2018/film/reviews/backstabbing-for-beginners-review-1202733485/
