Strange, But Not A Total Surprise

From this article in the October 5, 2007 edition of the Washington Post:

On a dusty street in south Kabul that still bears the scars of three decades of fighting, a 12-year-old boy is living the next chapter of "The Kite Runner," the best-selling book about friendship, betrayal and redemption in war-ravaged Afghanistan.

Last year, filmmakers came to the Afghan capital and, intent on bringing the story to the screen, auditioned 5,000 youngsters for starring roles. They plucked two local boys from obscurity and cast them as Amir, the privileged child who is the movie's narrator, and Hassan, his loyal, if underprivileged, companion.

For Zekeria Ebrahim, an eager and affable schoolboy with cheerful brown eyes, playing the role of Amir brought poignant reminders of his own past. Sitting cross-legged on his family's living room floor this week, he recounted his unscripted crying when acting in a scene about the loss of his character's mother, and explaining to the film crew how his own father had been killed in a rocket attack in Kabul just before his birth.

Now, in another strange blurring of fiction and reality, the filmmakers -- who shot the movie in China because of security concerns in Afghanistan -- have delayed the planned Nov. 2 release of "The Kite Runner" by six weeks while working to get Zekeria and the other child star, Ahmad Khan Mahmidzada, out of the country.

The move follows warnings that the two boys could face reprisal attacks over a scene in which Hassan, played by Ahmad Khan, is raped by an ethnic Pashtun thug....

[...]

"This is the mentality of the people in Afghanistan," which has a 28 percent literacy rate, Ahmadi explained. "People don't realize that it's not true. When they watch a film, they accept it -- it's real, why did they do it?"

[...]

The studio has offered to fly the boys to the United States later this month, where they could participate in the film's promotion and premieres. Afterward, they would reside in the United Arab Emirates at least through March, the start of the school year in Kabul....

The issue is a family's honor. Abdul Latif Ahmadi, the director of Afghan Film, tried to warn the filmmakers, but to no avail. Read the entire article HERE.

The following is a picture of the boys, from the Washington Post web site:

Ahmad Khan Mahmidzada, left, and Zekeria Ebrahim star in the film, whose premiere has been postponed to safeguard the young actors. (By Phil Bray -- Dreamworks)