Film Festival 09 - Song for The Southern Seas
Song from the Southern Seas
Pesni juzhnykh morej, Kazakhstan/Germany/France/Russia 2008,
84m
Director: Marat Sarulu
Festivals: Pusan 2008; Rotterdam 2009
Counteracting the damage wrought to the national image by Sacha
Baron Cohen, here's a smart, appealing film from Kazakhstan that
brings humour and the civilising values of a rich traditional
culture to its fable-like tale. Two couples, one Russian and one
Kazakhstani, were neighbours in a beautiful region adjoining the
arid grasslands of the Great Steppe. Miles from anyone else the
couples lived in intimate proximity, sharing one another's joys and
woes. Then the fair-skinned Russians gave birth to a boy with a
decidedly Kazakh complexion& Fifteen years later it may be time
for reconciliation. - BG. "Engaging sensitive and oft-divisive
material such as national insecurity about race, the tenuous link
between blood-lines and religion, and the role of women in a
male-dominated society, the film manages a light touch that
adroitly balances a painful history& with a generous dose of
universally affecting humor." - Ilya Tovbis, indieWIRE
In Russian and Kazakh, with English subtitles
