Featured reviews
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“Social journalism of the highest order, They Will Have to Kill Us First is by turns horrific and front-loaded with sonic heroism. It’s also one of the most vibrantly shot and masterfully edited documentaries of this or any other SXSW year.” – The Austin Chronicle
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"Johanna Schwartz’s miraculously hopeful documentary, “They Will Have to Kill Us First: Malian Music in Exile,” delivers a vibrant testimony of resilience under oppression." – New York Times
Latest reviews
“A profile in courage but also groove, Johanna Schwartz’s survey of Mali’s musical life post—Shariah law stands as an invigorating rebuke to Hollywood’s Whiskey Tango Foxtrots and Rock the Kasbahs.”
– Village Voice“One of the season’s top documentaries”
– The GuardianDisturbing and inspiring…an excellent, important documentary…Masterfully shot and edited.
– CBC Radio“There’s a moment about two-thirds of the way through this film about music and war in the African nation of Mali when a band of young men called Songhoy Blues gets a chance to tour England, and the sense of happiness for them in the audience is palpable.”
– Statesman“When a film starts with a history lesson told music video-style through French-language rap, you know you’re watching something unique.”
– Slackerwood“Sociopolitical tragedy forces rock back into service as a mode of struggle against oppressive and hypocritical authority, and old truisms — the idea that music can transcend borders, speak truth to power just by existing — become reinvested with meaning.”
– Grantland
