day 4

5/10/15 DAY 4 of the AVFF ’15

Some good Human Unity films and all the students films were on tap for today. In the morning there were two great movies “The Sower & Women For Justice” on tap. The first was about a Canadian artist who’s passion is planting heirloom seeds and making beautiful and colorful gardens. You follow him as he shares his passion with others. These heirloom seed varieties play a significant roll in creating our sustainable future whereas GMO seeds propel us down the road to farmer suicides, greater use of pesticides, more health problems, greater global warming and unsustainable agriculture.
The second film was a great film about women justice in India…the film follows several poorly educated women who find their voices via these women groups who advocate for women justice. These groups are all part of a Indian NGO who empower the women to use local women courts which they have created. These courts are very effective in giving women their voices and you see how articulate and confident they become because these courts. The courts are effective because the courts and jury are made of their peers.

Round Table Discussion on Human Unity
Sasikant and Suresh was joined by Kavitha and Marco (Artistic Director) and the roundtable started by discussing the film Girl Rising. Kavitha said that one reason she liked the film was because they used local village and city girls and paired them with local women journalist to capture their authentic voice and stories. The film depicts a number of women from the South/under developed countries and tells their stories. However the movie also supplies UN and other development data that highlights how we could quickly transform the South (and North-rich countries) by placing policy, money and infrastructure to assist women/girls. This path to development is faster and pragmatic, unlike the mythical ‘trickle down effect’ (putting most of the resources into the rich who will supposedly create weath for all via their investment – a Reagan and Thatcher – mythology that is still pursued today)
The panel and the audience also discussed The Sower…

The Students films:
At 4pm the MMC (theater) was overflowing – literally – the door to the MMC stood open for the first 10 minutes as children and adults jockeyed for seats and the floor to watch what are talented students of Auroville and the bio-region had produced. Lots of laughs, oohs and awhhhs, applauds, and sometime cheering. And after the audience came out they were asked to vote for the best film. The votes are in, the winner is known (but we’re not telling u!)…

At 6:30pm the herds came out of the theater and spilled into the eating/talking area and quickly queues (lines) formed at the Pizza and Maduram cafes…and so we started another evening of fine food and great conversation.

Movies: ‘Satyagraha Truth Force’ is a movie about a yogi and his followers who want to challenge the corrupt government and mafia who are destroying the Ganges River, the holiest river in India. The yogi uses fasting – I will fast until I die or the government will stop destroying the Ganga (Ganges). The movie watches the chess game between the ‘truth side’ against the baddies, each side trying to win the battle of the Ganga. Satyagraha loosely defined as “insistence on truth” and the articulate yogi has so much conviction that he is doing the right thing. One man against the machine, who will win?
Black Ice is about how GreenPeace activist go to Russia to stop the oil exploration and after a peaceful demonstration the Russian commandos board the GreenPeace ship and take the crew off to jail and then they are all tried and convicted. During this period the whole world protest the illegal capture and incarceration of the crew. Worldwide outrage and demonstrations against the Russian and the monarchy of the Netherlands request the release of all prisoners and we find out what happens…
Hey this was the first day of the film festival where it didn’t rain!