Before I can choose a single movie to consider my favorite, I must say that I enjoy movie perhaps excessively, especially recent releases. Ever since I begun college, I’ve had to cut back on the films I watch because I am running low on cash most of the time. In considering a favorite film, noting that there are too many possibilities, I chose to think of a ‘favorite’ film as one that not only entertains you, but it is also relevant and leaves you to think about the subject presented. With such criteria, the film the Constant Gardener comes to mind.
The Constant Gardener follows an Englishman (Ralph Fiennes) determined to uncover the murdered of his humanitarian wife as portrayed by Rachel Weisz. The wife became outspoken for her humanitarian work in the slums of Nairobi when she discovered that the drugs that were supposed to be helping these impoverished people were actually dangerous and causing deaths. On the verge of revealing that a major pharmaceutical company was testing drugs on people, she is murdered. The Constant Gardener is a truly powerful story of love, murder, and the powers of imperialism.
By ‘powers of imperialism,’ I mean this idea that persists that industrialized nations can easily take advantage of third world countries. This movie is a reminder of the outrage felt in Africa about colonization where presidents and prime ministers in Europe divvied up the continent in attempt to exploit the natural resources of the land and the people. The movie presents a modern day scenario where a pharmaceutical corporation, hiding behind legal babble and its humanitarian efforts, takes advantage of the people it’s supposedly helping by conducting research on them. Events in the movie are inspired by real events in 1996 in Nigeria where the pharmaceutical company Pfizer tested the drug trovafloxacin on 100 children sick with meningitis. The drug killed off 6 kids and the rest suffered life-altering injuries. Trial litigations are ongoing against Pfizer.
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