In a government storage house in Malawi, a thirteen year old boy sits with a hard earned bag of grain held close, as a not so lucky and extremely perilous mob that has gathered outside threatens to smash down the doors and barge in. The guards have no other option but to throw open the doors and instruct the ones inside to run for their lives when they do.
Chiwetel Ejiofor makes a notable entry as director in the feature film circuit with his film ‘The Boy who Harnessed the Wind’, in which he also plays a key role as the boy’s distraught father, Trywell Kamkwamba, who is appalled at losing the ones that he so dearly loves. A severe drought has ruined the crops beyond repair, and with the government machinery failing to set things straight, Trywell along with the rest of the residents of the tiny village of Wimbe, look forward to the long, obstinate months of famine that lie ahead.
When Trywell’s son William comes up with an idea to build a turbine, the older man scoffs at it, especially since the boy insists that it would require the dismantling of his much treasured bicycle. The boy, who had been thrown out of school due to his dad’s inability to pay the school fees is however optimistic, and manages to convince everyone around to lend a hand, and when the water finally gurgles in through the narrow pipe that he has laid out on the barren land, he saves an entire village from an impending, untimely demise.
‘The Boy who Harnessed the Wind’ has been remarkably scripted, and is a heartrending account of the hardships of a people, who despite the odds heavily laid out against them, hold on to the one thing that they simply cannot let go – hope. Sparkling with brilliant performances and loaded with sensitivity, it is a film that rises above its own predictability and emerges a strong testament as to how the determination of a young boy eventually wins over the intense desperation that pervades an entire populace.
Verdict: Good