15TH DOCS AGAINST GRAVITY FILM FESTIVAL 2018
MATANGI/MAYA/M.I.A.
Recommended. Starts with her saying she's "a terrorist's daughter" which grabs your attention immediately. You soon realise her father's a freedom fighter leading the Tamil Tigers - the only opposition the Sri Lankan dictatorship reckons with. Her uncle records rapes on women, some of whom are later ripped with grenades put in their vaginas to... conceal the traces of rape. The documentary, shot by Maya's school friend Steve, follows her from her arrival in the UK as a refugee, through the turning point when her protest song about the war back home had 1 million free Napster downloads which made her a star overnight. The video in which she repeats "I'm po-pu-lar" with a pout is amazing. The film features a lot of great music and Matangi's "bad dance moves" at home. She comes across as incredibly charismatic and talented, very headstrong. The movie proved to be a great hit among the festival audience.
In her home country the refugee hip hop star, currently residing in Britain, stays in all the time. Like she explained at the meeting after the screening that's because on the day of her arrival in Columbo, the capital, the 14 soldiers and police officers who had raped a woman at the main roundabout of the city, got acquitted of charges which resulted in mass protests. She was also harassed by uniformed men on a bus and was told by her mum to say no word or they'll end up killed in the jungle with no one knowing. She talked also about how years ago in the US she and her friend's tried to crash a Jay-Z's party. They actually got to his villa but turned back hearing women could enter only naked. Nowadays she's recording for his label. Another trivia she shared was that she had been growing up in admiration of Madonna as a strong woman and when she was invited by her to be her support at Super Bowl, for which the hip hop girl was paid $500, she felt appalled by how Madonna was pushed around by "those cowboys": "bend over!", "look here!" so she showed her middle finger to the cameras. Later she got sued for the gesture for... 16 million dollars. Looks like the case got dropped luckily. As for Napster, no hurt feelings, she used to use it too. With copyright she's "on people's side"
UNREST
Watchable. It proves chronic fatigue syndrome, or myalgic encephalomyelitis (ME), like it's called these days, exists. It actually disables people. In some cases after infections the germs stay in the body affecting the system so badly you can't walk farther than a few steps in the most severe cases. What's disturbing, since 85% are women, the condition's rarely taken seriously. In Scandinavia girls with the disease are typically taken away from families who are blamed for negligence and forcefully hospitalised. The documentary's shot by one of sufferers whose mild smile and 70s-style locks are quite annoying to look at.
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