Paradise lost

Even as Afghanistan observes the 10th anniversary of the US-led war on terrorism, Kabul saw its first Human Rights Festival. Nupur Basu was witness to a flood of humane stories that powerfully critiqued society and government.

October 15, 2011 04:42 pm | Updated 04:43 pm IST

Grim and truthful: A still from “Addicted in Afghanistan”.

Grim and truthful: A still from “Addicted in Afghanistan”.

In a lowly lit small Afghan hut, a mother sits picking at the dry bread on her plate. The soundtrack records her saying : “Every time I eat, I feel my bread is dipped in blood”. Her son, Zahir, is just 12 years old and is a drug addict. “Addicted in Afghanistan”, a documentary film made by Afghan filmmaker Jawed Taiman tells the moving story of two very poor young Afghan adolescents, Zahir and Jabbar, who are addicts. The filmmaker follows the children's lives spent in chasing their addiction, their deteriorating health, their attempt at treatment and rehabilitation and finally their relapse.

The film did what documentaries the world over attempt to do — tell a real humane story with a powerful critique of society and governments. The heartbreaking story of the two boys is the story of one million drug addicts in Afghanistan. It also set the tone for the week-long, first-ever Autumn Human Rights Film Festival (AHRFF), held in Kabul from October 1 to 7.

Emotional moment

In the feature film “An Apple from Paradise” Afghan filmmaker Homayoun Morowat scripts a gripping story about an old man who undertakes a frantic search for his missing son — only to find that he's been recruited as a suicide bomber from the religious school where he was studying. For Morowat, who bagged the best feature film award at the AHRFF in Kabul , it was an emotional homecoming. The Director had to leave Afghanistan and move to Sweden in 1998 due to the censorship he faced over his last film, “Golden Dream”. The question on everyone's mind as he received his awards was, is the regime of censorship finally over in Afghanistan and can filmmakers now pursue their subjects without fear that they may be hounded out of their country?

“These films are like windows of light for sharing human rights issues” said Rastin Shadmehr , Iranian jury member at the festival. He was also the script writer of Iranian film “Offside” by Iranian director, Jaffar Panahi. Panahi has since been jailed for six years in Iran and forbidden to make films for the next 20 years. Panahi's most recent film “Accordion” about two children whose accordian gets taken away from them for playing music in a mosque, screened in the AHRFF in Kabul. The Iranian authorities frowned in the sidelines. “In Iran we do not know what is happening — we are still struggling to understand why Panahi got thrown into jail — he is a film director not a political militant.” remarked Rastin.

The AHRFF, held for the first time in Kabul and Mazar-e-Sharif, had its anxious moments. There was also pressure on the festival authorities from the Iran government to withdraw the Afghan film “Neighbours” directed by Zubair Farghand. The film graphically depicted the brutalities on Afghan prisoners in an Iranian camp, Safaid Sang (White Stone) near the Iranian-Afghan border. Based on true life accounts from Afghan prisoners, the feature film was dark and had an universal story to tell about how prisoners from across borders are abused everywhere by security authorities. The film did screen under heavy security at the festival, despite active attempts to stop the screening by Iran.

Stark reminder

In Mazar-e-sharif screenings of feature films like “Paper Boats”, made by Afghan woman filmmaker Fariba Haidari, were stopped. The film traced the tragic lives of five young girls who are friends living in a conservative province of Afghanistan. “The Islamic Sharia Department disrupted the screenings of ‘Paper Boats' and ‘Death to Camera' — they pulled down the banners of the festival, shouted slogans and disrupted the screenings,” according to Malek Shafi, the Festival Director. “But we will have this festival every year as we hope that by running it in a territory of war and tragedy we will be able to make the cultural identity of Afghanistan independent from political and militarism aspects”, Shaffi said.

The festival showcased the works of several women Afghan filmmakers like well-known director Roya Sadat's “Taar wa Zakhma”. The film tells the story of a young 17-year-old carpet weaver who is married off by her father to a older man with three wives. The marriage is a cynical exercise to end the hostility between two warring tribes and the sacrifice is the young girl, Ay Nabaat. Kabul-born Aqeela Rezai in her documentary “We Stars” zooms in on the social ostracism and financial difficulties of women artists who have played an important role in Afghanistan's cinema. In “Half Value Life” Alka Sadat follows Marya Bashir, the first woman in Afghanistan who has become a senior provincial investigator and the threats she herself has to suffer as a woman officer in a high post. Both Alka and Aqeela picked up awards at the festival.

Stories of the struggle of women in Afghanistan was indeed one of the prominent themes at the AHRFF festival, with both women and men directors choosing this as a canvas to paint their story. Mohammad Haroon Hamdard's film “Shabana”, which mopped up several awards, is about a poor brick factory worker who is raped by the factory owner when her father is taken to the hospital for a night by her mother. The film is gripping and shows the potential of young directors from Afghanistan. “Mr. Fazili's Wife” by Hassan Fazili tells the story of a young Afghan woman who is struggling to treat her little daughter losing her vision and also lead an independent life at the same time. Sayed Qasem Hussaine's “Death to Camera”, which won the best documentary award, zooms in on a group of women construction workers who fight and abuse their employer for calling them sex workers because they are appearing before film cameras and also discuss whether President Karzai is a crook or a servant of the people.

“The Autumn Human Rights Festival in Kabul was long overdue — for 32 years there has been no platform to express human rights concerns although the number of abuses, whether it is to do with civic society or women have been huge — the festival held out a promise of a lot of good ideas,” said Humayoun Karimpur, an Afghan filmmaker who was on the jury along with Indian filmmaker Reena Mohan. For filmmakers like Karimpur, who have been living in France in exile since the 1980s, this was a poignant homecoming. “This festival is a very good beginning,” both Mohan and Karimpur stressed.

Twin successes

In the foreign documentary segment was “Iron Ladies from Liberia”, the film on the Liberian woman President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf's attempt to turn around her civil war-torn country with her handpicked powerful women ministerial colleagues and female police chief. Audiences in Afghanistan who have witnessed war for the last three decades watched the film with great attention for inspiration for their own country. While the film was picking up the best film in documentary category in Kabul, on the international stage Ellen Sirleaf was being feted with the Nobel Peace Prize.

As the curtain came down on the festival in a packed auditorium, Afghanistan's internationally feted Siddiq Barmak, winner of the Golden Globe in Foreign Category for his film “Osama”, urged the filmmakers to keep telling their stories fearlessly through features, documentaries and animation films. Barmak, who is a huge role model to young Afghan filmmakers, said that Afghanistan's true friend India, with its rich cinematic tradition and technical capabilities, could come forward in a big way to help Afghan filmmakers who have started blooming again after years of cinematic drought in a warn-torn country.

0 / 0
Sign in to unlock member-only benefits!
  • Access 10 free stories every month
  • Save stories to read later
  • Access to comment on every story
  • Sign-up/manage your newsletter subscriptions with a single click
  • Get notified by email for early access to discounts & offers on our products
Sign in

Comments

Comments have to be in English, and in full sentences. They cannot be abusive or personal. Please abide by our community guidelines for posting your comments.

We have migrated to a new commenting platform. If you are already a registered user of The Hindu and logged in, you may continue to engage with our articles. If you do not have an account please register and login to post comments. Users can access their older comments by logging into their accounts on Vuukle.