Theme:
MARGINALIZED CULTURES



Marginalized Cultures tells about the sustainable living of indigenous people, as they have been able to live in the forests of the world for thousands of years without destroying them. Indigenous people see that they are one with the surrounding  Mother Earth and live in harmony with it.


7. SCREENING: Justice. Now! / Oikeutta. Nyt! 

Friday 7.10
at 16.30, Kino Engel 1

Delayed Justice...?

India

2009, 61 min, Documentary, dvd

Director: Shriprakash

Producer: University of East Anglia

The film, with interviews of activists, government officials at several levels, intellectuals and ordinary people examines the implementation of Forest Rights Act (FRA) 2006 in the state of Andhra Pradesh. FRA is a radical Act, which the government of India passed in 2006, through which it finally acknowledged on a symbolic level the historical injustices that have taken place with tribes. With FRA, the government finally decided to set right some historical wrongs. The film explores the implementation on grassroots level and captures some blatant truths about the country’s labyrinthine bureaucracy. 

Eer – Stories in Stone
India 

2011, 56 min, Documentary, dvd
Director: Shriprakash

Producer: Public Service Broadcasting Trust (PSBT)

Shriprakash´s latest film, Eer – Stories in Stone, traces the oral history of traditions of various Adivasi communities of India. You can see the dark episodes of history which have never been a part of our so called "mainstream written history". Some of these oral stories are from the states of Rajasthan, Chhattishgarh, and Jharkhand in which the communities continue living, following their traditions.

9.SCREENING: Drowned out / Hukutetut 

Friday 7.10

at 19.00, Kino Engel 1

Drowned out
Intia

2002/04, 88 min, Documentary
Director: Franny Armstrong
Producer: Spanner Films

An Indian family decides to stay at home and drown rather than make way for the Narmada dam. Three choices. Move to the slums in the city, accept a place at a resettlement site or stay at home and drown. The people of Jalsindhi in central India must make a decision fast. In the next few weeks, their village will disappear underwater as the giant Narmada Dam fills. Difficult questions arise: Will the water go to poor farmers or to rich industrialists? What happened to the 16 million people displaced by fifty years of dam building? Why should I care? Drowned Out follows the Jalsindhi villagers through hunger strikes, rallies, police brutality and a six year Supreme Court case. The novelist Arundhati Roy also attends the struggle in many ways. The film stays with the villagers as the dam fills and the river starts to rise...


11. SCREENING: Defenders of Their Lands / Maanpuolustajat
Friday  7.10

at 21.00, Kino Engel 1

The Crusade for the Forest (also known as The Killing of Chico Mendes )

Brazil

1990, 57 min, Documentary, bluray

Director: Adrian Cowell
Producer: Ludgate Ltd.

The film tells the story of Chico Mendes whose brutal murder on December 22, 1988, provoked international protest and brought worldwide attention to the problem of Amazonian deforestation. The film follows his rise to prominence as the leader of the rubber-tappers, or seringueiros. The seringueiros have lived in the rainforest for over 100 years, subsisting by tapping native rubber, collecting Brazil nuts, and other ecologically sustainable activities. Seeing their way of life threatened, Mendes formed the seringueiros into a union and led the fight to halt the devastation of the rainforest and to create protected areas, called "extractive reserves", to be managed by local seringueiros communities. The film is the concluding part of The Decade of Destruction series.

Coconut Revolution

Papua New Guinea 

2000, 52 min, Documentary
Director: Dom Rotheroe

Producer: Stampede

Bougainville, with a population of only 160,000, has managed to close and keep closed one of the biggest mines in the world. They have held their ground for a decade with antique weapons and homemade guns. These people have taken on the biggest mining company in the world and won.


16.SCREENING: First Nations / Ensimmäiset kansat
Saturday 8.10

at 17.00, Kino Engel 2

Nainen Son La’sta (The woman from Son La)

Vietnam

2010, 28 min, Documentary, dvcam
Director: Rostislav Aalto

Producer: Zen Media   

The document film on the woman belonging to the Black Thai minority people in mountainous Northern Vietnam, in the shadow of the Son La Dam. Ms Luong Thi Thoan collects the hair and sells it straightened to the Vietnamese traders. By that she gets much longed additional income to buy her children school books and clothes. The main character has got a micro credit meant for women funded by Finnish Vietnamese Friendship Association and Finnish ODA.

The Last Joik in Samiland Forests? / Viimeinen joiku Saamenmaan metsissä? 

Finland

2007/2011, 60 min, Documentary, dvcam

Director: Hannu Hyvönen

Producer: Elonmerkki

The Finnish governmental Forest and Park Services in logging the most northern pine forests in Inari, Lappland. Most of the pulp wood  goes for making pulp in Stora Enso factories, and most  of the logwood goes to the Peuravuono sawmill. Finnish state is the biggest owner in both companies. Most of the logwood is sawn to become the cross-ties for State Railways.

These same areas belong to the constitutionally acknowledged Sami (Indigenous people) native region and legislative reindeer herding area. The question on the rule of these regions is still unresolved. Finnish state has not been able to produce documents that prove that the ownership of the land has been moved from Sami people to the Finnish state.

The long time smoldering forest conflict flared up into full flame in the spring 2005 as Greenpeace put up its forest station in Inari.  Is Finland stealing the Sami land? Are human rights violated in Upper Lapland?