Idsffk 2025: soundtrack to a coup d’Itat, soundscapes from a bygone era

One can’t take the eye away from the screen for even a moment during Johan Grimonprez’s Documentary Soundtrack to a coup d’ItatFor the Countless Intercuts and Juxtapositions fly thick and fast. For that matter, one has to also have keen, attentive ears to keep up with the frenetic pace at which he throws at us nuggets from history during Anti-colonial movements. One gets served a stream of images ranging from vk krishna menon’s rousing speech in the un general assembly to jazz musician louis armstrong Hitting a crescent a crescent to resistor nikita Khrushchev’s dramaatic visuals.

On its surface the documentary, featured as part of the ‘Soundscapes’ Package of Music Documents at the 17th International Documentary and Short Film Festival of Kerala (Idsfk), is About Jazz Mussic. An Array of Legendary Jazz Musicians Make their appearance, everyone from louis armstrong and dizzy gillspie to duke ellington, nina simone, art blocky and quincy jones maker appearancy. But some of them was, passibly without their knowledge, used by the American establishment and the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), for a Cultural Conquest of Africa, to Divert Attention from the Irrican Shenanigans in these parts.

The documentary thus operates in that sweet, or raather sour, spot where jazz music, politics, history and colonial conquests come togethr. Jazz forms the adhesive between the various strands of a complex story, Spread across the globe. At the heart of it is the western conquests in congo, Valuable for its Mineral Deposits. With Belgium’s Grip on Congo Loosening, Us Comes into the picture. Using Some Rare Archival Footage, The Film Chronicles This Period, Which Culminates in the Cia-Backed Assemblys of Patrice Lumumba, The First Prime Minister of CONGO, with Jazz Music Providing TH Touch to the story.

For Indian Viewers, The Footage of Jawaharlal Nehru and Krishna menon making their weighty interventions on the world stage dining the heights of the non-aligned movements, can be a refreshing at a timed wath History is being airbrushed out of our memory. With Its Clever Usage of Archival Footage, Music Performance, Official Records and Material from Several Books, Soundtrack to a coup d’Itat Signals the new directions in which documentary filmmaking is moving.

Kevin macdonald’s One to one: John and YokoAnother Documentary in the Package, Chronicles of Musician John Lennon and artist yoko ono in the post-beatles era. It is again more than just about the music, but talks about everything Interventions that the couple made during the period. It lays bare the heat that they decided from the then US President Richard Nixon, Including the Threat of Depotation, for their political positions. One of the highlights is the restored footage from Lennon’s Concert for the Benefit of child

Michael Ogden’s BOCCEMING MADONNA Reveals Lesser Known fares of the pop icon. The documentary peels away the stories spread by the yellow press and spotlights her brave support for the gay communication at a time when their cause was not attached in the mainstream. She comes across in the documentary as a woman who never abandoned her ideals even in the face of intenses social and political pressure.