Orlando von Einsiedel makes an absorbing, distressing documentary about people protecting a park. Its thriller-like urgency can press too hard, but the attention to rangers and gorillas gives the film a purpose beyond keeping us anxious.
Virunga is a forceful, upsetting documentary, and well worth the discomfort of watching it. Orlando von Einsiedel approaches the protection of gorillas as work carried out by people whose own safety cannot be taken for granted. The film has the pace and pressure of a thriller, and sometimes leans on them too heavily. But the rangers’ commitment gives us ample reason to stay with it. There is a job to be done here, under conditions that make doing it dangerous.
The aerial photography allows us to see the park as a place, rather than simply hear that it needs saving. These expansive views give us a sense of the territory for which its defenders have taken responsibility. The editing moves between that scale and the more intimate human stories without letting either become a distraction from the other. We understand why the landscape matters, but we are also kept aware that somebody has to look after it. The images are handsome without making the park feel safely remote.
That human emphasis is the film’s strongest choice. André Bauma, Emmanuel de Merode, Mélanie Gouby and Rodrigue Mugaruka Katembo give it several lives to attend to, and the interest in individuals keeps the campaigning from becoming a lecture. Orlando von Einsiedel allows the people defending the park to matter in their own right. There is nothing particularly reassuring about seeing how much depends on them. The gorillas remain central, but the film does not treat the people protecting them as incidental to their story.
We were frightened by the combat footage. The attention to the rangers makes their safety matter, so the violence does not feel like an exciting change of subject. Knowing that the people on screen face real danger makes the familiar techniques of suspense uncomfortable to enjoy. The camerawork gives the fighting a force that would be impressive in a fiction film; here, admiration for the filming quickly becomes a secondary concern. It is difficult to settle back into the usual pleasures of a thriller.
The reservation is about how hard Orlando von Einsiedel presses that suspense. At times we wanted more room to consider the rangers’ work without being kept on alert for another threat. The editing is assured, but its urgency can make the direction of our feelings conspicuous. The quieter portraits have already done enough to earn our concern, and some of the insistence feels unnecessary. This is a limited complaint about a persuasive film, though it matters when the people on screen are capable of holding our attention without such strenuous encouragement.
As a conservation documentary, Virunga understands that protecting animals involves human labour, loyalty and risk, and it keeps those things visible. That gives it more force than the aerial views alone could provide. At 100 minutes, it is concentrated enough to leave its people distinct in the memory, although the pressure can be tiring. See it for the rangers and the gorillas, but choose an evening when being unsettled is something you can bear.
