Walking out of the cinema following the world premiere of The Dead Sea last week, I could not help but feel immensely moved by the situation which this film addresses.
What was more troubling than the subject matter were the visuals that will probably stick with me forever – I know this because I last felt this way while covering crime on the general news desk and in those days it was easier to access crime scenes, but the downside was the dead bodies that one saw in their violated and raw states. Those images never leave you.
The Dead Sea, from Indian director Leena Manimekalai, is a poignant film that looks at the lives of Tamil fishermen and the atrocities they faced during the Sri Lankan war.
There are so many aspects that make this film a huge success in terms of Manimekalai’s intention in producing it. It tells the very real and tragic stories of victims on both sides of the conflict, it reflects the atrocities of the Indian and Sri Lankan governments in neglecting to deal with the issue of these unwarranted attacks and murders on the Tamil fishermen and women, their families and refugees caught up in the war. It is a blend of fiction and documentary. Asside from stories recounted by widowed fisher wives, there are a few real-life video clips displaying violence and inhumane slaughter of innocent men.
One clip, cellphone footage by an Indian journalist, is particularly moving. To witness men being tied up like animals, stark naked, kicked and slapped about and then shot in the head is something that is hard to look at and stomach, but it is also an image that is difficult to ignore, which I’m sure was what Manimekalai wanted – to give the audience a taste of a harsh reality.
In an interview the morning after her film’s premiere at the Durban Film Festival, Manimekalai explained how her initial intention was actually to make a film about Rose Mary, a widowed fisher wife who lost her husband during the conflict and subsequently became a refugee, but upon learning how these fishermen would go out to sea and be attacked and killed by the Sri Lankan Navy and how the Indian government ignored the people’s cries over these atrocities and more, her study took on a broader scope.
“This film is dedicated to all those fishermen who lost their lives over the last 30 years and to all my brothers and sisters who managed to survive in the midst of that silly war… In 2009, the Sri Lankan government, in the name of civil war, bombed hospitals and schools. The Indian government, up until recently, did not report on it… journalists were banned from reporting on it so at the time journalists, activists, students fought in protest on the streets…
“The Tamil fishermen living on the border coast have a right to fish and earn their living. But they were attacked and killed for crossing the border… how do you determine a border when you are out at sea, fishing as you have for many years before without trouble?”
Manimekalai said during her year’s worth of research for this movie, she heard of far worse atrocities against the Tamil fisher-men than those portrayed in the movie.
“They were not just killed. They were stripped naked, stories of fathers and sons who went out fishing, who were caught and forced to have sex, or they would be tied up and forced to swim to shore and they’d drown, villages raided, women raped…
“It was not just about killing innocent Sri Lankans but also Indian fishermen who were attacked and killed for crossing water borders. We need to expose these governments as murderous governments, even if they did not do anything. By looking away, they also committed the murders.”
Manimekalai said many people who watched the screening approached her afterwards, saying they were not aware of what had happened, but she was not surprised.
“We always hear of the war in Palestine or the famine in Sudan, but what about the deaths and starvation happening just outside your home? What makes one life more valuable than another,” she asked, adding, “All my films are about social injustice; the caste system in India, rape, child marriages… when you lobby with a community, you stick with it until there is social change… I don’t expect to effect change after one film, but at least it will help speed up the process of change.”