“House of My Fathers (Mouna Kaandam/Nomiyana Mathakaya)” ---Singapore International Film Festival
Release Year: 2018
Country: Sri Lanka
Director: Suba Sivakumaran
Cast: Bimal Jayakodi, Pradeepa
Location I watched: The Cathay
Story from the programme booklet:
In this political parable set in the primeval forests of Sri Lanka, the civil war has left a terrible mark on two villages---one Tamil, one Sinhala. A ‘death strip’ separates the two due to their constant fighting. And no child has been on either side of the barbed wire for some time.
The villages receive messages from their respective gods that they are each to send a representative to an isolated place, where they will find the secret to renewing life. However, only one will return. As the Tamil woman and the Singhalese man chosen to heal the villages enter into the Forest of the Dead, they are forced to confront both provincial secrets and their own personal pasts.
Two villages confronting each other have been hit by the curse of infertility. To solve this crisis, a representative from each village, one man and one woman are sent to “the Forest of the Death” (I just call it a magic forest). The man, Asoka is a former soldier and now an outcast. The woman, Ahalya is a widow who also lost her son. The film is a kind of fantasy and also an allegory. However, for some audience, its presentation as a film may look boring.
For example, in this magic forest of night, four soldiers are suddenly coming toward Asoka and Ahalya with the crunch of walking footsteps. It is an impressive scene. Nevertheless, this forest --- where the dead are wandering --- itself looks like an ordinary and loose forest. It does not look too mysterious.
Both characters entering the magic forest are wearing casual clothes. Asoka’s fashion --- wearing a shirt and carrying a travelling bag --- is like an Indian uncle whom I see everywhere here in Singapore. Their clothes are not for camping in the forest at all, but since this film is like an allegory beyond realism, it should be OK.
The actress played Ahalya is not a stunning beauty, but her breasts are huge (it is obscene comment, but I could not help noticing that). She was beautifully shot, and it is an outstanding point of this film. Her existence is the key in the story. Only one can return from the magic forest. That one is, of course (I have to say), the man. After the woman gave birth to a magic baby in the forest, she had to die (since this baby boy was born immediately after conception, I just call him a magic baby). The man brought back the baby to his village. On the other hand, the woman, the baby’s mother was not mentioned afterwards.
Although the mysterious power of the magic forest manifests, eventually I read the story of this film as a tacit conspiracy of the two villages hating each other. Faced with the fatal crisis of infertility, the two villages cooperate each other to save their own clan. Instead of cutting the barbed wire separating the two villages, they use their own villager regarded as an “unnecessary” person---“a traitor” and a widow without children.
In the last scene, the audience realizes that the narration is done by the grown-up magic child. He laments the death of his mother and uterine brother whom he has never seen. Then, I was a little startled and felt an ache in my heart. “House of My Fathers” was a requiem for a mother who had been never mentioned, thus never had a requiem. (16 May 2020)
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| Going to the magic forest in casual wear |
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