2014 1h 30m · Documentary · ★ 8.5

Death Metal Angola

Following nearly 40 years of unrelenting war, peace and reconstruction are slowly arriving to Angola. Huambo, Angola’s second largest city, finds 55 children in the Okutiuka orphanage under the care of Sonia Ferreira. Her boyfriend, Wilker Flores, is a death metal guitarist who uses sounds and rhythms of this hardcore music as a path to healing. Or, as Sonia says, “to clear out the debris from all these years of war.” The feature documentary follows Wilker and Sonia’s attempts to stage Angola’s first-ever national rock concert, bringing together members from different strands of the Angolan hardcore scene from different provinces, as it all unfolds in fits and starts, against the bombed out and mined backdrop of the formerly stately Huambo.