13 documentaries will be screened on Sunday in the ongoing fifth Film South Asia (FSA) ’05 – a festival of documentaries –that kicked-off in Kathmandu at Kumari Hall, the commercial duplex cinema at Kamal Pokhari on Thursday.

Altogether 44 films from Nepal, India, Bangladesh, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, Afghanistan, Burma, South Africa and Canada are being screened at the FSA ’05. Eleven of these films will be world premieres and several of them South Asian premieres, the organizers said. The films were chosen from among 189 entries received.

The best film will be awarded the Ram Bahadur Trophy with cash award of US $ 2000. The film adjudged second best will receive a prize of US $ 1000. For the first time, a Best Debut Film award has been instituted, carrying a cash award of US $ 1000.

The festival is organized every two years since 1997 by Himal Association together with Himal South Asian magazine.

The films to be screened at Kumari Hall on Sunday as follows:

The Life and Times of a Lady from Awadh: Hima

An Urdu language film directed by Shireen Pasha, will be screened at the Hall A at 9.00 a.m. This documentary, on 90 year old Hima, explores the extraordinary time in the history of the subcontinent (Awadh after the decline of the Mughal Empire in the 18th century). It traces history, Hima’s life, and her relationship and letters with her renowned Talukdar writer father.

My Village is Theatre, My Name is Habib

A film made in English / Hindi / Chattisgarhi languages by Sanjay Maharishi / Sudhanva Deshpande will be screened at the Hall A at 12.00 a.m. It documents the events that followed when Tanvir and the actors of Naya Theatre came under attack from the Hindu Right in August-September 2003 for performing the anti-untouchability farce Ponga Pandit, and records the making of the play Zahareeli Hawa, Tanvir’s translation of Rahul Varma’s English play Bhopal on the Union Carbide gas tragedy of 1984. The film seeks to capture the contributions of octogenarian director Tanvir, who followed his dreams and never bowed to pressures social, political, or economic.

Search For Freedom

A film by Munizae Jahangir will be screened at the Hall A at 2.00 p.m. The film traces the dramatic social and political history of Afghanistan from the 1920’s to the present through the stories of four remarkable women: Princess Shafiqa Saroj, sister of the beloved progressive King Amanullah (1919-1929); Mairman Parveen, the first woman to sing on Afghan radio; Moshina, a war widow and survivor of a Taliban massacre; and Sohaila, an exiled medical student who ran underground schools for RAWA (Revolutionary Association of Afghan Women) during the Taliban regime.

With stunning early 20th century archival footage that captures a time of progress that belies most Western perceptions and later footage that reveals women’s resilience under a near constant string of occupations, through these women’s stories a surprising portrait of Afghanistan’s history emerges. Defying the image of Afghan women as mere victims, It offers a nuanced portrait of women who uncover choices where none are offered, who continue to find hope in the face of exile and isolation.

City of Photos

A film directed by Nishtha Jain will be screened at the Hall A at 3.15 p.m. The film explores the little known ethos of old neighborhood photo studios in a variety of Indian cities, discovering entire imaginary worlds in the smallest of spaces. Tiny, shabby studios that appear stuck in a time warp turn out to be throbbing with energy.

As full of surprises as the people who frequent these studios is the way in which they choose to represent themselves; the backdrops they enjoy posing against and the props that they choose.

These afford fascinating glimpses into individual fantasies and popular tastes. Yet beneath the fun and games runs an undercurrent of foreboding. Not everyone enjoys being photographed; not every backdrop is beautiful; not all photos are taken on happy occasions.

The cities in which these stories unfold become a backdrops themselves, their gritty urban reality a counterpoint to the photo palaces. Desires, memories, and stories, all so deeply linked to the photographic experience, come together as part of a personal journey into the collective city of photos.

I for India

A film made in English and Hindi languages and directed by Sandhya Suri, will be screened at the Hall A at 4.30 p.m. In this film Director Suri presents his personnel journey. In 1965 Yash Pal Suri left India with his wife and young daughter for medical school in the UK. The first thing he does on his arrival in England is buy two Super 8 Cameras, two projectors, and two reel to reel recorders sending one set of equipment to his family back home and keeping the other set for himself. For forty years he uses it to share his new life abroad with those back home. Images of snow, mini-skirted ladies, the first trip to an English supermarket, are all couple with his taped thoughts and observations, providing a unique chronicle of the eccentricities of his new English hosts.

Back in India, his relatives respond with their own ‘cine-letters,’ telling tales of weddings, festivals, and village life. As time passes and the planned return to India becomes an increasingly remote possibility, the joy and curiosity of the early exchanges gives way to the darker reality of alienation, racism and a family falling apart.

A Million Steps

A film directed by Pankaj Butalia will be screened at the Hall B at 9.00 a.m It is a film on the Indian surveyors who went incognito into Tibet in the 1860’s in order to complete a mapping project.

Home of the Brave – Land of the Free

A film directed by John Sullivan, a director and screenwriter will be screened at the Hall B after the film A Million Steps. This is one-of-a-kind documentary that takes a unique a look at the manner in which the US Special Forces operates in Afghanistan. The film was shot in February 2003 by John Sullivan and Gar Andreassen while staying in Jalalabad under the protection of a local warlord. Never before has anyone followed the actions of the US Special Forces so closely from such a perspective.

Land of the Diggers

A film directed by Biju Toppo, director of a number of films to help raise awareness on behalf of those who suffer little-known human rights violations, most often Indian indigenous peoples and other inhabitants of his own home, Jharkand will be screened at the Hall B at 10.30 a.m. It looks at the tension and consequent violence that can come from the desperation of unemployment and starvation, the role of globalization in the suffering of the Adivasi, and how this tea garden community and the Jharkani Diaspora may be able to rally together for survival.

In this film the director is trying to explore past and present ancestral connections to the tea gardens, with the current crisis faced by the Adivasi laboring community. The tea gardens are being shut down on a massive scale, and with them schools, health centers, and even running water.

In The Shadows of the Pagodas – the other Burma

A film directed by Irene Marty will be screened at the Hall B at 11.30 a.m. It is a picturesque journey through fairytale Burma, the Golden Land of a thousand Pagodas that ends in the jungles where hundreds of thousands of internally displaced people live, on the run from the government army. Ruled by a military junta, Burma is regularly condemned by the UN-HCHR for sever human rights violations. Yet the much of the world is unaware of the suffering of millions of Burmese civilians.

It is a depiction of the genocide committed against Christians, Muslims, and other ethnic minorities of Burma, flourishing right next door to areas of international renown and exquisite beauty.

The Curse of Talakad

A film directed by Sashi Sivramkrishna, an economist by training with several research publications to his credit, has endeavored to translate some of his interest in research into the audio-visual medium will be screened at the Hall B at 2.00 p.m The film uses archaeological, geological, and historical analysis to explore the evidence that supports the validity of the curse uttered so long ago. Through the analysis of historical information culled from archival records and old travelogues, the filmmaker was able to unravel the mystery of Talakad – almost.

Kaalam

A film by Ramachandran K will be screened at the Hall B at 3.00 p.m. It attempts to capture the creative genius of Pallavoor Appu marar and the time in which he lived by interweaving episodes culled from his autobiography Pramanam, performance pieces that illustrate his deftness in creating silent interregnums, and interviews with his family, friends, and contemporaries.

Girl Song

A film directed by Vasudha Joshi will be screened at the Hall B after the film Kaalam. This half hour documentary enters the life of Anjum Katyal, blues singer, poet and mother, capturing her voice as she performs the blues in her home city of Kolkata, as she reads her poems and journal entries aloud to her daughter, and as she converses with her mother of the cultural heritage she is so proud to be a part of.

Anjum also talks of confronting the climate of hostility and distrust towards minorities that is spreading throughout India. In her interactions with her mother and daughter, we see how a cultural identity woven from many diverse strands is increasingly under threat from more narrow and exclusionist definitions of identity.

Lanka-The Other Side of War and Peace

A film by Iffat Fatima, an independent documentary filmmaker based in Delhi will be screened at the Hall Bat 4.30 p.m. The film is an act of recalling and remembering the brutal and tragic consequences of violence; witnessed most poignantly, as those who have suffered through this violence narrate their stories of loss, displacement and survival, giving expression to the larger narrative of war and peace.

Nepalnews will be providing special coverage of the Film South Asia 2005 including pre-screen reviews for the benefit of our audience.