We Were Rebels

In November 1990, a 10-year-old boy named Agel got an AK-47 in his hands for the first time. He was subsequently trained as a fighting machine in the struggle for an independent South Sudan. Along the way, he lost countless friends and family members. After his time as a child soldier, Agel made it to Australia by way of Kenya, and now he is a free man and back in a newly independent South Sudan. As captain of the national basketball team there, he sees how the fragile democracy of the youngest country in the world is being reflected in his players. In the first game against Uganda, the multitude of coaches along the sidelines leads to a comical yet meaningful confusion about responsibilities within the team. Filmmakers Katharina von Schroeder and Florian Schewe followed Agel for two years, from his country’s independence until the manifestation of new tensions. We see Agel as a basketball player and as a founder of an NGO, with which he seeks to provide remote areas with clean drinking water. He is constantly on the road, driving through the mud in a country without infrastructure. Meanwhile, he shares his clear vision for the future of his traumatized country, but tensions between various ethnic groups aren’t exactly helping matters. Will Agel pick up arms again for the first time since when he was a boy?