The documentary about the brutal rape of Jyoti Singh paints a frightening picture of the women's view of Indian culture.
(THIS ARTICLE IS MACHINE TRANSLATED by Google from Norwegian)
India's daughter.
Directed by Leslee Udwin
Directed by Leslee Udwin
India's daughter by British filmmaker Leslee Udwin tells the gruesome story of the group rape of 23 year old medical student Jyoti Singh on a bus in New Delhi in December 2012, which garnered massive international attention and resulted in an ongoing debate about women's situation in India. The British and Indian-produced documentary, which was recently shown on NRK, has also generated a lot of controversy. Not least in connection with the Indian authorities having a legal break to ban the film, which was originally to be shown on Indian and British television on Women's Day 8. March. The rationale was that the film put India in a bad light and that it let a convicted rapist speak out. In addition, there have been doubts, among other things, as to whether proper permits for this interview were granted.
YouTube complied with the government's demand that it not be shown in India – with the result that the film has instead been frequently spread through other channels on the web. The BBC, for its part, responded to the Indian ban on speeding up the screening in the UK by four days. And for those here at home who want to see the movie, it is available on NRK's website for a long time to come.
The strong reactions to this sexualized killing have sparked India's dormant death penalty. Two steps forward can suddenly lead to one in the opposite direction.
India's daughter does not really contain as much information as was not already known, but is nevertheless an important document due to the fact that the filmmaker has got so many people involved in speech. In doing so, the documentary gives a detailed insight into the events, and draws a frightening picture of an extremely troubled view of women that seems to be very prevalent in the world's largest democracy.
It makes an exceptionally strong impression to describe what ailments the young girl went through that fateful evening and the subsequent time until she died from the extensive injuries she sustained. Jyoti Singh had been to the cinema with a male friend, and at about noon in the evening, the two took a private bus they thought would drive them home. On board were a group of six drunken young men (including a 17-year-old, who in India is a criminal justice minor), who first beat up the comrade and then carried out the rape. Here, an almost incomprehensible (but not necessarily exceptional) brutality was shown. In the film, we hear from both doctors and her desperate parents how Singh was also abused with an iron pipe, to the extent that the intestines hung out of her body. So broken were several of the organs that the doctors did not know what to try to sew together again. Early on, they announced that she was unlikely to survive. The 23-year-old had only a short practice period ahead of her before she even began her medical practice. The education had gone to great lengths for parents to afford, despite the fact that many around them felt that this was not worth doing for a girl.
The documentary [...] paints a frightening picture of an extremely troubled woman's view that seems to be very prevalent in the world's largest democracy.
Almost as disturbing is hearing the people involved and their lawyers more or less defending the bestial wrongdoing. Mukesh Singh is one of the six convicted (he is even sentenced to death by hanging), but claims in front of the camera that he was not particularly involved. Nevertheless, he makes hair-raising statements that decent girls would not roam at this time of day. In his view, girls are far more responsible for rape than the men who actually commit them. It's like a grotesque, reinforced echo of statements one can hear here about how girls who "dress indecently" and go out on the town like to "ask for it." The same medieval view is even more steadfastly persecuted by a couple of the defendants' defense lawyers. “We have the best culture. In our culture there is no room for women, ”one of them says in the film. And with that, he basically points to the essence of the problem, which one could possibly hope to have something done in the wake of all the attention this matter has received.
As a documentary India's daughter fairly well-made, without formally opening any new doors. We mainly get the story told by "talking heads", supplemented with reconstructions, illustrations and clips from the media. A slightly solid form, which is just as well suited to convey this story. The main strength of the film is, as mentioned, the access director Udwin has got to various people involved, from the survivors via activists, investigators, lawyers and government officials, to the convicted and their families. Nevertheless, it should be said that she could have spared the use of discrete slow motion effects on some of the interviews. What is formulated is more than strong enough that you need to emphasize the points of this kind of cheap manipulation. But this is nevertheless a minor objection to a movie that gaps over a lot without being unfocused. Towards the end, it even gets a thought-provoking comment that the strong reactions to this sexualized killing have sparked India's dormant death penalty. Two steps forward can suddenly lead to one in the opposite direction.
Through the many who share their views in the film, draw India's daughter a broad and outrageous image of a culture permeated by a view of women far less valuable than men. At the same time, it is worth noting, as Nettavisen's Gunnar Stavrum recently pointed out, that one is just talking about the "Indian" culture instead of the "Hindustani". This is an example to follow, since not all religions would be left out in the same way in similar contexts.
Huser is a film critic in Ny Tid.
alekshuser@ Gmail.com
alekshuser@ Gmail.com
