List of Films for TFSA 2004

Bhedako Oon Jasto -
In Search of a Song ... (55 min)
Nepal, 2003, dir - Kiran Krishna Shrestha
Winner of the Special Mention at FSA ’03
For eight years, a well-known Nepali journalist, would sing an unknown folk song he’d heard in the highlands north of Kathmandu to his friends and to strangers. Since no one had heard the song, he travelled up the mountains north of Kathmandu with members of a popular Nepali band and a friend, the filmmaker, in search of the source of this song.

Buru Sengal (The Fire Within) (57 min)
Jharkhand/India, 2002, dir-Shriprakash
Winner of the Grand Jury Award at FSA ’03
The land of the Tana Bhagats in Jharkhand, India, a peaceful sect of the Oraon tribe who follow a Gandhian lifestyle and philosophy, is today beseiged by Naxalite violence. The film touches upon corruption, the mafia, energy politics and displacement of villages, and tribal identity in an area where coal has been mined for the last 150 years.

The 18th Elephant—3 Monologues (62 min)
Kerala/India, 2003, dir-P. Balan
Winner of Ram Bahadur Trophy for the Best Film at FSA ’03
This film is a critique of modern man’s mercenary attitude towards nature and his anthropocentric conception of development. The sad plight of the elephant in both its wild and domesticated states exposes how such behaviour brings death and wreaks havoc on the lives and habitats of other species.

Godhra Tak: The Terror Trail (60 min)
Gujarat/India, 2003, dir-Shubradeep Chakravorty
The film investigates the Godhra train burning and subsequent rioting that killed 3,500 Muslims in Gujarat, India in February, 2002. It retraces the route of the first batch of karsevaks from Gujarat to Ayodhya (where Hindu fundamentalists want to build a Ram temple) and back, and documents the terror they unleashed en route, and the incident at Godhra railway station.

Hunting Down Water (32 min)
India, 2003, dir - Sanjaya Barnela and Vasant Saberwal
India’s present water crisis is of its own making. The patterns of water use are changing, with increased cultivation of water-intensive cash crops. But there are other changes that defy logic, such as the growing number of private swimming pools in cities, rain dances and water amusement parks. As a consequence more and more of the rural poor are now forced to migrate.

Itihaas Jitneharuka Laagi (History for Winners) (55 min)
Nepal, 2003, dir - Pranay Limbu
An award-winning singer makes a desperate but unsuccessful attempt to make a comeback after being in musical hibernation for seven years. Itihaas Jitneharuka Laagi portrays the changes in the Nepali music scene, as represented by Kuber Rai and Dhiraj Rai. The two singers are a study in contrasts, with their diametrically opposing personalities and attitude towards music.

Made in India (39 min)
India, 2002, dir - Madhusree Dutta
A rural artist paints her autobiography, images of Bollywood movie icons are erased after a week-long run of their films, the national flag flutters on 150 kites, installation artists paint pop icons on the rolling shutters of shops. Symbols of nationalism become a fashionable commodity. Made in India is about contemporary visual cultures in India.

Naata (The Bond) (45 min)
Bombay/India, 2003, dir - K P Jayasankar and A Monteiro
Naata is about Bhau Korde and Waqar Khan, two friends who work on conflict resolution and communal amity initiatives between the different communities in Dharavi, reputedly, the largest “slum” in Asia. Naata is the second in a series of films on the people and city of Mumbai, and is a sequel to Saacha (The Loom), 2001.

A Night of Prophecy (77 min)
India, 2002, dir-Amar Kanwar
The film travels in the states of Maharashta, Andhra Pradesh, Nagaland, and Kashmir. Through poetry you see where all the territories are heading towards, where you belong, and where to intervene, if you want to. The narratives merge, allowing us to see a more universal language of symbols and meanings. This moment of merger is the simple moment of prophecy.

Resilient Rhythms (64 min)
India, 2002, dir - Gopal Menon
India’s caste system places nearly 160 million people, the dalits, at the outskirts of society. It exploits their services but at the same time denies them acceptance as human beings. Resilient Rhythms deals with a range of dalit responses to their marginalisation, from armed struggle to electoral politics.

Sand and Water (105 min)
Bangladesh, 2002, dir - Shaheen Dill-Riaz
Winner of the Third best film award at FSA ‘03
The middle section of the Jamuna, one of the three main rivers in Bangladesh, is called “the deadly paradise”. Sand and Water shows how the people of the islands here live in the most extreme natural conditions and cope with the “moods” of Jamuna, which also provides them with their livelihood and fertile islands.

Shei Rater Kotha Bolte Eshechi (Tale of the Darkest Night) (43 min)
Bangladesh, 2001, dir - Kawsar Chowdhury
Winner of the Second Best Film Award at FSA ‘03
The film tells the story of the killings by the Pakistani army in Dhaka University. Surviving members and witnesses speak, and bring alive the havoc of that night. The documentary also includes the wireless messages the Pakistani army exchanged that night.

Swara - A Bridge over Troubled Water (40 min)
Pakistan, 2003, dir- Samar Minallah
Swara examines and comments on the Pakhtun practice, in northwest Pakistan, of giving minor girls in marriage as reparation for serious crimes such as murder committed by their fathers, brother, or uncles.

The Unconscious (19 min)
Maharastra/India 2003, dir - Manisha Dwivedi
This film is a journey with men who call themselves kothi. They are men for their families and society, but for themselves they are women, and wives of other “macho” men. They walk two tightropes, both of fear and disgrace of and for their families and ‘husbands’. And yet, they celebrate womanhood in their world of disguises.

Vikas Bandook Ki Naal Se (Development Flows from the Barrel of the Gun) (54 min)
India, 2003, dir-Biju Toppo and Meghnath
The film gives voice to people affected by development projects—and repressed by the state for speaking out. The film asks why most of these incidents have taken place in areas where indigenous Adivasi people are majorities, and leaves us to ask why, in the age of globalisation, the state has turned from protector to predator.