Portrait

i’ve been following the debate on groundviews about sam de silva’s film, circles of violence. tulsi’s post about it has generated interesting discussions and comments.

however, through reading most of what was said on groundviews regarding the film, i found myself highly disillusioned by the so-called educated adults of our community. everyone seems to only want to put forth over educated, pedantic, analytical theories. the true feelings, the opinions, are all lost in a sea of big words and pseudo intellectual bile.

sam’s film for me, informationally, was nothing new. as someone who has kept my eyes and ears open to the world around me, and also living in a household like mine, i am well aware of the tragedy that has engulfed our people. i don’t need a film to skim over the headlines of the past 50 years in order to learn that. but i refuse to forget my most initial, instinctive reaction to it. it tugged at my heart strings. it made me dwell on our country’s history of violence and conflict, it made me fear greatly what sort of fate we are in store for. surely, sam made this film as someone who hadn’t stepped on sri lankan soil since childhood. it was a personal journey, as he keeps insisting, and not an objective, political commentary on the uregency of the current situation. viewing it from the perspective of someone who was only armed with a camera and a curiosity, a near-foreigner who returned to the country of his parents to discover for himself what sort of place it was, i think it accomplished what it sets out to do.

someone says on groundviews ‘I did not attend the screening, even though I knew about it and was in fact invited by a friend of the film-maker, mainly because it was held Barefoot’. you did not attend the screening of the film? then clearly, this is not the discussion for you. the discussion on groundviews was about sam’s FILM, not the location at which he chose to screen it.

some might say that i inhabit barefoot an awful lot and therefore i am obliged to defend it. it’s not like the individual who left that comment does not enjoy the luxuries of a financially well-off life. just because one does not go to barefoot, it does not make one the symbol of sincerity and social equality. in the same way, just because one does go to barefoot, it does not make one a head-in-the-sand capitalist fuck.

barefoot, besides being a nice, outdoor location, is run by two of the few people in colombo who support local intiatives by young sri lankans, mostly involved in the arts. dom and naz are two of the few people someone like sam can go to and know that he is amongst support. dom and naz are two of the few people who would give bloggers a space to meet (as they did last year at no cost). although barefoot does often exhibit work by foreign artists (i don’t see what’s so wrong with this anyway, it is educating if at all, and is a good chance for people in colombo to get acquainted with the work of many wonderful painters and photographers who aren’t in the limelight of the mainstream, whose work is offbeat and unusual that no one else here exhibits) they do very often support local artists and are open to many interesting, novel ideas. ask tracy holsinger of fringe theatre company, mind adventures, or indi who organized the meeting for kottu bloggers last march. barefoot is a liberal, free space where many interesting people meet and many interesting conversations take place.

what someone like sam needs is genuine criticism (preferably from someone who’s seen the film). not a garbled mess of pretentious, insincere thoughts. many of those that left long comments on groundviews don’t seem to have truly examined what they really thought about the film. what do you really think? what was your first reaction to the film? this is the stuff that’s important.

although a lot of people seem to think that this film is useless for sri lankan citizens and is only good to show overseas, i beg to differ. as i said on a post on groundviews, i think this is a good and important film to show teenagers and school goers in colombo. you will be alarmed at what a bubble some people of my age group live in. what better way to give them atleast a hint of what’s going on than to show them a 45 minute long film?

despite having minor issues with the film, i give sam a big round of applause for simply trying.