Marupakkam Online Film Screening # 20 : Some Stories Around Witches

Marupakkam Online Film Screening # 20
From 6 pm, 16 Oct (Friday); for 72 hours only

Film : Some Stories Around Witches
Dir: Lipika Singh Darai, 53 min; Odia with Eng subtitles; 2015; Documentary
Produced by PSBT

Synopsis : The film does not deal with witchcraft as a practice. It depicts the humanitarian crisis surrounding the cases of witch hunting taking us closer to the people, who have been accused, ostracized, tortured and the circumstances that have led to it.

The film primarily engages in three cases from some parts of Odisha, India, which finds resonance in other parts of the country as well. A teenage girl kills an old woman, one of her relatives thinking that she is a witch and the cause of her father’s death. A village turns into a mob overnight to kill three people, a man and two women who were identified as witches by a witch doctor. A family believed to bring ill fate, ex communicated and threatened after they cooked meat.

Talking about the nuances of the incidents, the film tries to explore the politics of witch hunting - how superstitions, greed, ignorance, fear, insecurity, power in combination can result in immense suffering.

Crew Details :
Director & Editor : Lipika Singh Darai
Associate Director and Cinematographer : Indraneel Lahiri

Production Assistant: Archis Maan
Sound Editor: Alok Shanti Jha
Sound Mixing: Gandhar Mokashi

Film Festivals :
SIGNS Film Festival, Kerala 2016.
Queen City Film Festival, Maryland, US 2016
Equality Film Festival, Kiev 2016
Free Net World Film Festival, Serbia. 2016
15th International Images Film Festival for Women, Zimbabwe, 2017
Mumbai International Film Festival, MIFF 2018
Shimla International film festival 2017
Indian Film Festival of Bhubaneswar, Odisha, 2018
Social Justice Film Festival, Chennai, India, 2018
Indigenous Film festival of Odisha, 2019
And many independent screenings by film societies and educational institutes across the country.

About the director : Lipika is a filmmaker based in Bhubaneswar, Odisha. She is an alumnus of FTII (Film and Television Institute of India) with a specialization in film sound recording. Her journey as an independent filmmaker has taken her all across the culturally diverse state, while documenting the work and lives of folk artists, recording traditional songs of her native Ho tribal community and following the voice of resistance in communities.

Lipika’s films are characterized by strong personal narratives. She is inclined towards mix media work , art research and art performances. Her works try to reflect on the times we are in through a sense of introspection in her films. While her documentary, “Some stories around witches” investigates the humanitarian crisis surrounding the cases of witch-hunts in recent times, her short fiction film “ The waterfall”, specifically made for schools, underlines the need for the voice of resistance to reduce the growing distance between human beings and nature.

Lipika was one of the artists in "City as Studio project" under SARAI, CSDS. In 2017, She participated in “Seoul Biennale of architecture and urbanism” as a visual artist and filmmaker from India. She has been in the jury Panels for various film festivals including IFFI( international Film Festival of India) - Indian Panorama.

Lipika's films have been screened across various national and international platforms. She has received four National Film Awards in non-feature film category in various capacities in the period of 2010-2017 presented by the President of India.

She is currently finishing a feature length documentary produced by Films Division, India, on the folk art form of puppetry in Odisha.

Interaction : We invite you to an online interaction with the director on 18th Oct, Sunday @ 11 am.

Click here to watch the film (from 16th Oct, Friday @ 6 pm )