Sunday, January 01, 2006

kekexili - the mountain patrol

The movie is about a group of volunteers protecting the endangered tibetan antelopes on the western high deserts of china. The volunteers are not paid, are ill-equiped and are losing to the poachers when the movie starts. We witness the killing of a lone volunteer by the group of poachers. This news brings a reporter from beijing to the place and the rest of the story is told from his perspective. The group has a strong leader, Retai, who commands the respect of the rest of the group. The other members of the group are mostly village guys who have their simple life someone to love them back in the village. The force that’s binding is the love for the tibetan antelopes and the hatred for the poachers. The most moving moment was the scene where they see the carcasses of the antelopes which were killed by the poachers. We feel the emotions in their mind, as they react to it. Its as if a part of their body is dead and that too because they failed in their duty. Another moving scene shows the exhilaration of the group when they manage to push their truck out of the mud in the river, a task which looked impossible.
They tracks down the group of local people who helped the poachers, and carries on to find the poachers. We slowly witness the grant and peaceful high desert turning into a dangerous third group trying to defeat the volunteers, one part is stranded with a broken jeep with no provisions in the snow, another guy takes a wounded volunteer to the hospital and while coming back with supplies, is sucked in by quicksand. The great Ritai marches on with the reporter fellow and is killed by the poachers.
The movie is based on true incidents and they say that one year after the defeat of the volunteer group the government started steps to protect the antelopes. Also some of the remaining volunteers were charged for selling the confiscated skins which they were doing as a last resort when out of money for patrolling.

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