Films by Suma Jasson

I Want My Father Back 2007, 50 minutes, Hindi/Marathi with English sub-titles Direction: Suma Josson Camera: Rakesh Haridas, Sachin Gadankush Editing: Krishnendu Sarkar‘ 

 I Want My Father Back’ is a film on the suicide of farmers in Vidarbha. Vidarbha is in the eastern region of Maharastra State in India. The film looks at the reasons behind these suicides, beginning with the fall- out of the Green Revolution, the changing traditional methods of farming, especially with regard to seeds, the globalization process, the debt-loan trap faced by farmers, and the devastating effects of Bt. seeds. The film speaks in favour of organic farming and ultimately shows that the death of the farmer also means the death of the soil. sumajosson@yahoo.com http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=09SoQ7hQvGM&feature=bulletin

Niyamgiri, You are Still Alive 2011, 17 mins, Oriya with English sub-titles Direction: Suma Josson Camera: Rakesh Haridas, Tapan Vyas Editing: J. Valiakulathil, Nisha Josson In 2006 Sterlite, a subsidiary of UK mining company Vedanta built a refinery in Niyamgiri Hills, Orissa, India. The intention was to mine bauxite from the Niyamgiri Hills, which is in reserved forest. It is also home to indigenous communities who are dependent on it for their livelihood. They have been fiercely opposing Vedanta. Mining on Niyamgiri will destroy its rich biodiversity and wildlife. The toxic waste material from the refinery pollutes air, ground and water. On August 24th, 2010 a turning point was reached in the struggle to save Niyamgiri http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VJt59wbNI6s

Before The Last Tree Falls

70 mins, 2006; Direction: Suma Josson; Camera: Joselin J. Alphonse, P. Pratapan; Editor: Biju V. Sukumaran

‘Before The Last Tree Falls’ is a 75 min film on the suicide of farmers in Wayanad, Kerala, India. The film looks at the totality of the subject -- the switch to cash crops, the exploitation of natural resources like soil and water to maximize production, the over use of fertilizers and pesticides, which results in diseases to both humans and crops -- and consequently the setting in of an environmental disaster in Wayanad.

Films by Adoor Gopalakrishnan

Kalamandalam Gopi - 1999
directed by Adoor Gopalakrishnan

In the film Gopi is presented in the first person narrative. The film watches as the artiste transforms himself into diverse and glittering personalities and, in the process, we obtain rare glimpses of his life and art.As has been the experience of many a master, Gopi had a difficult childhood marked by poverty and travails. Gopi is adept at playing all types of roles, whether the characters are pacha, kathi of kari. But Kathakali's connoisseurs prefer most of all to see him portraying pacha (i.e. noble and heroic characters and, indeed, he has excelled in such roles.

The film won the State award for best documentary in 1999.

Films by Anjali Monteiro & K.P.Jayasankar

Our Family Dir: Anjali Monteiro and KP Jayasankar ; 56 mins; Tamil with English subtitles; 2007 

Set in Tamilnadu, India, ‘Our Family’ brings together excerpts from Nirvanam, a one person performance, by Pritham K. Chakravarthy and a family of three generations of trans-gendered female subjects. Aasha, Seetha and Dhana, who are bound together by ties of adoption, belong to the community called Aravanis (aka Hijras, in some parts of India). Aasha Bharathi, the grandmother, is the president of the Tamilnadu Aravanigal Association, Chennai. Seetha, the daughter lives with her male partner Selvam, in Coimbatore. Dhana, Seetha’s adopted daughter also lives with her and shuttles between her adopted and her natal families. 

 She Write Dir: Anjali Monteiro & KP Jayasankar; 55 min; Tamil with Eng.subtitles; 2005 

 SheWrite weaves together the narratives and work of four Tamil women poets. Salma negotiates subversive expression within the tightly circumscribed space allotted to a woman in a small town. For Kuttirevathi, solitude is a crucial creative space from where her work resonates. Her anthology entitled Breasts (2003) elicited hate mail, obscene calls and threats. The fact that women poets are exploring themes such as desire and sexuality been opposed by some Tamil film lyricists, who have gone on record with threats of death and violence. This has been resisted by a collective of poets and artists called Anangu (Woman). Malathy Maitri is a founder member of Anangu. Her poems explore feminine power and spaces. Sukirtharani writes of desire and longing, celebrating the body and feminine empowerment. The film traverses these diverse modes of resistance, through images and sounds that evoke the universal experiences of pain, anger, desire and transcendence.

Films by Vinod Raja

Mahua Memoirs
Dir:Vinod Raja; 82min; Kannada, Telugu, Oriya, Hindi with Eng.subtitles; 2007

Saloo, the bard, and Thirku, the Baiga, take us on a journey through the lives of the many adivasi communities who live in the mountain tracts and forests of the Eastern Ghats across the states of Andhra Pradesh, Orissa, Chattisgarh and Jharkhand. As in most indigenous homelands the world over, these regions too are rich in natural resources including minerals; resources that have become the source of their greatest insecurities.

Through their stories and songs, interwoven with the metaphor of Bewar, a form of shifting cultivation practiced by many adivasis, the film unravels and unfolds both their life visions and their struggles against the merciless mining, particularly over the past two decades, that is consuming their lands and their lives.

Films by Sreemith

Filling the Blank
Dir: Sreemith; 50 Min; Malayalam with Eng. subtitles

Dalit women autorikshaw drivers Chitralekha and Elizabeth, living in the northern part of Kerala, trying to fend for their living in the male and upper caste domains of work being bullied out…; two independent Muslim women, their aunties and their children living in a rental house run by the mosque committee, and not succumbing to the sexual mores of the local men,not being allowed to live in peace and ultimately sent out from their homes, as there was no male family member permanently living with them…

Films by Leena Manimekalai

Goddesses
Dir:Leena Manimekalai; 42 min; Tamil with Eng. subtitles

Notes from the lives of three extra ordinary women – a funeral singer; a fisherwoman; a graveyard worker. Here is the story of three ordinary women who live extra ordinary lives surviving darkest of times and gone against society's norms to live and work according to the rules they have set for themselves.

Films by P.Baburaj & C.Sarachandran

‎1000 Days and a dream
Dir: P. Baburaj & C.Saratchandran; 60 mins; Malayalam with English subtitles;

On the four and a half years old anti-Coca Cola struggle in Plachimada, Kerala. Perhaps, no other agitation in recent times in Kerala has attracted national and global attention like this one. The film captures the spirit of the struggle, traces the history and discusses the several issues raised by the struggle. It also documents the poignant moments of the struggle and shares the dreams and sorrows of some of the active participants of the struggle.

Films by KR Manoj

A Pestering Journey
Dir: KR Manoj; 66 min; Malayalam, Hindi, Punjabi, Tulu, English; 2010

A voyage through two pesticide tragedies in post Independent India,
A Pestering Journey is an attempt to interrogate the legitimate forms and technologies of killing available in a culture. Taking a pestering turn, the journey blurs the boundaries of nature and culture, of self and other, of life and death and many other comfortable binaries we inhabit. It tries to ask how much regard for life a culture should have to ponder over the question, what a pest is.

Films by Saraswathi Kavula

BETWEEN THE DEVIL AND THE DEEP SEA
Director : Saraswati Kavula : Duration: 73 Minutes

It is a documentary film that documents the troubles and travails of the traditional marine fisher folk from Andhra; to bring into focus, the relationship between environment and the survival of human beings as also their social well-being. And most importantly, the need to do a rethink about high yielding but short sighted methods of development and economics.

Continuously combating dangers on the sea, getting little in return due to the exploitation of natural resources by the mechanized trawlers on one side and monetary exploitation by the loan sharks on the other, with an impassive Government which hardly bothers to take a holistic look into the problem, the life of the traditional marine fisher folk is hanging “Between the Devil and the Deep Sea”.

Films by RR Srinivasan

Old sea and the man
Dir: RR Srinivasan; 70 mts ; Tamil with Eng. subtitles; 2006

The tsunami that occurred on 26 December 2004 was clearly one of the deadliest natural disasters the world has seen in recent times. Resulting in 8081 deaths in Tamilnadu, hundreds of thousands more displaced, and massive infrastructure destruction, there is no doubt that concerted and long-term attention needs to be paid to the rebuilding of the affected communities.

This documentary made in post-Tsunami situation of Tamil Nadu (south India) clearly brings out the range of human rights violations of the coastal communities in the name of “development”. Through the views of the coastal communities across the coast line of Tamil Nadu, this documentary exposes the design of the State to forcibly relocate the fishing community from their pre-tsunami settlements that amounts to completely uprooting them from their livelihood resources.

Films by KP Sasi

Living in Fear
Dir: KP Sasi; English, Hindi, Malayalam, Kannada; 33 minutes; 1986

Indian Rare Earths Limited, a nuclear plant in the southern state of Kerala in India, has generated grave concern among people for occupational and environmental hazards caused by radiation. Through interviews of workers, scientists and concerned individuals, this film questions the way nuclear energy is used in India.

Films by Challam Bennurarkar

Kutti Jappanin Kuzhandhigal (Children of Mini Japan)
Dir: Challam Bennurarkar; 63 mints; 1990; Tamil with English Subtitles

The film focuses on the plight of young poverty-stricken children working in Sivakasi in the late 1980s, and the Government's neglect of them. The children worked in factories famed for producing fireworks and matches. The film takes its name from the nickname of Sivakasi, (Mini-Japan), a name given to the town for its high technology and business standards.

Films by Amudhan RP

Pee (Shit)
Dir: Amudhan RP; 26 min; Tamil with English subtitles; 2003

Mariyammal, a sanitary worker with Madurai Municipal Corporation shares her frustration and anger with the filmmaker while cleaning a street near by a temple in Madurai which is full of shit.