War photographer puts experiences in film
Brian Dodds’ Heart Within Darkness contains his own footage of Cambodia. Photo: Submitted.
In between trips to Asia and around New Zealand, filmmaker Brian Dodds recently spent a few weeks at his Central Takaka home to present his allshorts Film Festival documentary, Heart Within Darkness.
The short compilation, cut together from two longer films made by Brian, shows footage of the horrors of war in Cambodia while touching on the need to work for peace and unity to overcome poverty and despair.
“I thought at first that the film might be too serious for the film festival,” said Brian, adding that he did not intend to show an anti-war movie but to stimulate discussion about the causes of war.
In 1974 and 1975, Brian worked as a war photographer in Vietnam and Cambodia, where he witnessed the violent siege of Phnom Penh by the Khmer Rouge and horrifying attacks on civilians. He narrowly escaped, and was guided to the Thai border by his friend Kha Chan Ly, where he was intercepted, robbed and threatened, and Ly was imprisoned for illegally entering the country.
Brian stayed in a Buddhist temple for two months and concentrated his efforts to have his friend acknowledged as a refugee and successfully released from prison.
Brian originally left his hometown, Dunedin, to live in Australia as a married 24-year-old car designer for British Leyland. A trip to London via Asia took him to Bali, where he spent time in a remote grass-hut village. There, in 1974, he was introduced to the art of ritualistic healing. He then went on to Vietnam and to Cambodia and became involved with photography and filmmaking there.
He has since spent 13 years in Asia, many in Japan working as a jeweller/designer. He has also spent time in Laos and India and has developed a deep affinity with Asian lifestyles and spirituality.
Faced with a serious viral infection, he embarked on a continuing journey to find alternative ways to overcome pathogenic disease using kinesiology for diagnosis and researching the history, causes and cures of the AIDS virus. He has published articles and a book about how to engage the brain in the healing process and ways to strengthen the immune system.
“I started to research the brain and DNA, and my conclusion is that DNA can be reprogrammed and the brain repatterned. You have to be careful when you repattern the brain; if you don’t know what you are doing it can be very damaging. Like an electrician who does not know what he is doing, you can blow the circuit,” Brian explained.
“The western model is very much designed to alleviate the symptoms without addressing the causes of disease. Often you feel better while your conditions worsens, and that is what happens with the anti-retroviral drugs. The drugs inhibit the replication of the virus but then it takes only a few years before the virus learns to resist that drug.”
Brian’s research took him to an orphanage on the Burmese/Thai border near Maesai. Here, high up in the mountains covered in dense jungle, he hopes to build a healing centre for children who have lost their parents to HIV and are themselves infected with the virus. Because these children are not Thai citizens and not recognised as refugees, they are not entitled to general hospital care, said Brian. He is now looking for people to help fund this project.
Brian also made a film about swine flu vaccinations that was shown at the Village Theatre some time ago. More information is available on www.fullgeneration.com
Ina Holst
