February 2004 • Issue 364



Best of the Year: Film

Strong female leads seem to be the common thread of the NI’s best films of the year. In Far from Heaven (NI 354), writer-director Todd Haynes’ subversive retake of the Hollywood ‘women’s picture’, Cathy lives the ‘American Dream’ – executive husband, perfect home and family, beautiful and fashionable clothes, even the leisure time for charitable work. Yet, when seen in public with her black gardener, her life unravels.

The main character of Niki Caro’s uplifting Whale Rider (NI 359), also struggles against conformity and chauvinism. Pai, only 12 years old, but resourceful and courageous, is an obvious natural leader of her Maori community, yet as a girl is excluded from tribal initiation.

In Spirited Away (NI 361), Hayao Miyazaki’s beautiful and subtle animated fantasy, Chihiro is a self-centred teenager who learns to value others while being true to herself.




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FROM THIS ISSUE

You get proud by practising
A poem by Laura Hershey, poet and disability activist.

Strong & smart
Teacher Chris Sarra is turning upside-down ideas about what Aboriginal kids can and can’t do.

I was born white
Mark Minchinton undertakes a journey back to his – and his country’s – Aboriginal roots.

Equality Watch: Race & Ethnicity

Betrayal
Two years after the liberation of Afghanistan, are its women really free? Report from Mariam Rawi.

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IN THIS COLUMN

Fish Tank
A film that gets inside the mind and feelings of a young person deeply at odds with the world. Written and directed by Andrea Arnold.

Birdwatchers
The reality of indigenous life in the Amazon. Directed and co-written by Marco Bechis

Three Miles North of Molkom
At a new age festival in Sweden, a group of people who’ve never met before explore tree-hugging, sweat lodges, shamanism, tantric sex.

Sin Nombre
A road movie cum Western. Or, rather, it's a railroad movie and the 'West' - where innumerable migrants are headed on railroad wagons - is more accurately the 'North', the US.

Burma VJ – reporting from a closed country
This is the story of ‘Joshua’, an underground video journalist. By Anders Ostergaard






Voices from the margins:

Multimedia: video, podcasts, and more.

House of Hunger Poetry Slam in Zimbabwe
Poetry Slam in Zimbabwe
The House of Hunger poetry slam held in Zimbabwe in 2006, and organised by the Pamberi Trust, showcased young artists performing inspirational work on issues from corporate power to child soldiers. The video features four of the poets.
Published by Pambazuka News.
Raised Voices video:
Atossa Soltani from Brazil on the Climate Change
Desmond Desai from South Africa on Corporate Power
Iranian Women Speak Out
Iranian women speak out
3 March 2007, London. Women's rights activists marched through the English capital last week to celebrate International Women's Day with a protest against the misogyny of the Islamic regime in Iran and the threat of invasion by the US. Hear the voices of Iranian feminists Azar and Leila Parnian and the sounds of the demonstration as it passed through the heart of the city. Click here to learn more about the campaign.
Produced by Heidi Bachram.
Raised Voices audio:
Benny from West Papua on Corporate Power
Vinayan from India on agriculture

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