Film Festival "Insights into women´s worlds" 2003

TERRE DES FEMMES´ third Film Festival

On the occasion of the international day „NO to violence against women“ TERRE DES FEMMES presents for the third time its film festival from 13th to 19th of November - in co-operation with the women’s representative for the University Town of Tübingen. Over 30 feature films and documentaries from more than 20 countries will be screened at several cinemas in Tübingen, Rottenburg, and Heidelberg. The films will offer the audience the possibility to reflect on women from different cultures and provide various cinematic delights.

Highlights

Some of the festival‘s highlights will be several award-winning feature films, which will soon be screened at German cinemas: the opening film “Real Women have Curves”, German first night “Silent Waters”, Cannes award-winning “At 5 in the Afternoon”, “Red and Blue”, and “Lilja4-ever”. „The Little Republic“ by Anwar Jamal tells the story of some fearless female council members in Indian villages.

Themes

According to TERRE DES FEMMES’ current campaigns, special attention will be paid to the issues of forced marriage and the social rights of women textile workers. Various films cover the theme of arranged or forced marriages. So for instance, “Fire” by controversial Indian director Deepa Mehta, and the Israeli film “Kadosh” by Amos Gitai. “Le Marriage d´Alex” by well-known film-maker Jean Marie Teno is about a polygamous marriage. Another important topic is domestic violence. Films from different cultural backgrounds try to counteract prejudices, which say that forced marriages are the product of certain religious believes. Even though religions, such as the Islam, seem to support this custom, it becomes obvious that the main force behind it is a patriarchal social system, which dominates in many cultures around the world. The witty classic satire “Adam’s Rib”, starring Katharine Hepburn as a passionate and self-confident woman, amazes with its quite advanced discussion about equal rights of men and women, more than 50 years ago.

The films about the situation of women workers focus mainly on two aspects: The first is the dramatic unemployment rates in the North and the inhuman conditions of workers in the South, which are the results of rapidly increasing globalisation. This problem is shown impressively in “Ouvrières du Monde”. The second is the violence, which is provoked merely by the fact of women working in factories and consequently gaining some independence. This is illustrated in “Performing the Border” with the example of the murders in Ciudad Juarez, Mexico, and in „Une Femme Taxi à Sidi Bel-Abbès“, a film about the spreading Islamic fundamentalism in Algeria.

A number of films pay attention to specific topics of TERRE DES FEMMES like trafficking of women, female circumcision - depicted in “The Day I will never Forget” by Kim Longinotto - women in Islamic societies, and stories of women who are fighting against discrimination and oppression in various ways. “In the Time of the Butterflies” another German first night featuring Salma Hayek, is one of the festival’s highlights. The film recounts the stories of the three Mirabal sisters who were killed in 1960. The day they died on 25th of November was pronounced as the international day “NO to violence against women”. “Borinboresi” by Gerrit Schwarz and Agnes Neumayr shows how some women in Ghana use their creativity to solve their difficulties and be able to survive. Together they paint lovely pictures and patterns on their round clay brick houses, while dancing, chatting, and tale-telling.

Special highlight: Afghanistan

Afghanistan is an important subject among the festival’s films, since the bad living conditions of Afghan women seem to be forgotten because of the crisis in Iraq. A special highlight is the feature film “At 5 in the Afternoon” by Samira Makhmalbaf , as well as the documentaries “Afghanistan Unveiled” by Brigitte Brault, filmed by the first afghan camera-women ever, and “Frauen von Kabul”, a long-term study by Elke Jonigkeit about different women in Afghanistan.

Guests

As a special part of our programme some directors from different countries will be invited to Tübingen to present their films and take part in a discussion on the topic: “Women’s rights in regions of conflict- a cineastic look”. A number of films deal with war and conflict, for example in Kosovo or Israel/ Palestine. In particular the films concerning the conflict between Israel and Palestine focus on alternative peace strategies developed by women. So for instance, Mai Masri’s “Hanan Ashrawi” or Shira Richter’s “Two States of Mind”. Additionally, there will be two photography exhibitions: one about Afghanistan, by Elke Jonigkeit, and the other about Ghana, by Agnes Neumayr.

We wish our audience many beautiful, moving, reflective, and amusing moments during the film festival and we would like to thank everyone who supported us.

Christa Stolle   

Director of

TERRE DES FEMMES