I think they did a magnificent job of showing the stark, gritty, in-your-face reality of life for many people in our world. It wasn't glorified, it wasn't scandalized, there were no quick fixes. Just people struggling to help the handful they can. This is what it's really like.
In addition, the way the arms-smuggling angle was covered was also very deftly handled. It wasn't condoned, the problems, the reasons, the advantages and the consequences were all demonstrated. But at the end of it all the viewer is simply left with the question "so what do you do?"... they sure weren't going to hand over a half-digested pat answer.
Every so often a movie comes along that shows us how "the other half lives", movies like The City of Joy, Baraka, Salaam Bombay. I'd put Beyond Borders in that category. Perhaps not quite as brutally true-to-life as the former, but I think the love-story aspect may pull in some viewers that would otherwise not go anywhere near such sights, and that, I think, is a very good thing.
In addition, the way the arms-smuggling angle was covered was also very deftly handled. It wasn't condoned, the problems, the reasons, the advantages and the consequences were all demonstrated. But at the end of it all the viewer is simply left with the question "so what do you do?"... they sure weren't going to hand over a half-digested pat answer.
Every so often a movie comes along that shows us how "the other half lives", movies like The City of Joy, Baraka, Salaam Bombay. I'd put Beyond Borders in that category. Perhaps not quite as brutally true-to-life as the former, but I think the love-story aspect may pull in some viewers that would otherwise not go anywhere near such sights, and that, I think, is a very good thing.