The Venerable W.

Barbet Schroeder's documentary The Venerable W. (Le vénérable W., 2017) is available to watch online on iFILM — a portrait of Ashin Wirathu, the Buddhist monk who leads Myanmar's most virulent anti-Muslim movement.

Known to his critics as "the Burmese bin Laden," Wirathu heads the 969 Movement, which has turned religious identity into a tool for riots, arson and displacement — under the flag of a faith built on nonviolence. Schroeder, who earlier trained his camera on Idi Amin (1974) and terrorist defense attorney Jacques Vergès (2007), completes his informal trilogy of charisma and harm with the same method: let the subject talk, offer no narrator, and trust the audience to draw its own conclusions. Stream The Venerable W. online on iFILM.