of Madness
Letras Libres: Very timely… What is happening in the here and now
What is happening on this planet, in the here and now, is what Edgar Hagen's The Roots of Madness (Switzerland, 2026) presents to us. It was the best film I saw at Visions du Réel 2026, presented and overlooked in the Swiss national competition.
It is a timely documentary focused on veteran German journalist Ulrich Tilgner, who has covered conflicts in the Middle East for over 40 years. Filmmaker Hagen accompanies Tilgner as he revisits the various conflict zones the German journalist has reported on—Afghanistan, Iraq, Syria, and other places in the same region—to confirm that, shocking news!, everything has worsened, with the same common denominator: the constant US intervention which, from the beginning, and to paraphrase Hillary Clinton herself, “We came, we saw, we screwed up.”
Tilgner doesn't place the blame solely on the United States, nor does he absolve Germany or the rest of Europe: he points to the undeniable roots of this madness and the enormous responsibility of "civilized Europeans" for the brutal colonization of these territories—the Middle East, Africa, you name it—and their criminal rejection of the inevitable migration caused by hunger, destruction, and genocide. With Trump currently playing war games in Iran, the documentary is as educational as it is depressing. And, of course, it never navel-gazes."
May 7, 2026, by Ernesto Diezmartínez
letraslibres.com/cine-tv/documentales-entre-el-ombligo-y-el-mundo/07/05/2026/