Nepal
Nepali with English subtitles
Three Nepali siblings from the village document their new lives as city dwelling, young adults.
"After making two films about the Darnal family—Drawing the Tiger (2015) and The Eldest Son (2017)—the filmmakers recognized the curiosity of the Darnal teenagers to be behind the camera and document their own lives. Literate is a collaborative, experimental documentary with Sarita, Rashmita and Ram Kumar Darnal as the directors of photography. The film has been edited from their footage, shot over two years. It is a piece still in process, part of a larger, ever-evolving project of documenting the Darnals’ lives over the past decade. Though making documentaries has become more accessible than ever, we recognize that doing so has essentially remained an art of the privileged. Since we started filming the Darnal family in 2008, our films have been part of a deepening and increasingly urgent conversation about whose story is being told, and by whom.
‘Subject,’ ‘character,’ ‘protagonist,’ ‘participant,’ ‘collaborator’—all are used to describe those who appear in a documentary—but to varying degrees, all center the gaze of the producers.
We have interviewed Sarita, Rashmita and Ram Kumar about growing up in the village, their education, how they see their futures. We captured and controlled their stories via our western, documentary and narrative lenses.
After having pointed cameras at them for many years, we wanted to know what they would choose to show of their own lives. Literate is an exploration of how the Darnals express themselves from behind the lens.
Literate does not follow a story arc, but is a collection of images from three young Nepalis during a huge transition in their lives—leaving their village to come to the city as the first in their family to read and write. What do they see? What do they want to say?
We have known Sarita, Rashmita and Ram Kumar Darnal since 2011, when they were small children. They participated in two of our previous films, which focused on their older sister and brother. While in production on these projects, the younger kids would pick up our cameras and shoot around the village with their friends. We loved finding these images among our footage. It was like behind-the-scenes from our documentarian presence.
Spurred by Nepal’s earthquake, the Darnal family made the decision to move to Kathmandu in 2017. It was at this time the three siblings, now young adults, expressed interest in filming their new lives as city dwellers. We applied for a grant to purchase cameras. The cinematographer on our two previous projects, Shailendra Karki, created a camera training course for them. Our instructions for Sarita, Rashmita and Ram Kumar were the following: Turn on and point the camera when and in the direction you feel compelled; to show the story you want to tell.
We then braided their footage together. We are submitting this as a Work-in-Progress due to the project being stalled by the pandemic. We will incorporate more of their commentary in its next rendition.
From our ‘fly on the wall’ footage during our previous films with the Darnals, it was not uncommon for a mic’d family member to reflect upon us and our experience: “Why does Amy want to film me do the dishes again? She must be bored. I hope she is not too hungry and hot in the sun.” Although we did not appear on camera, we, the filmmakers, were very much part of the films.
When we received the Darnal siblings’ footage via a DHL package in Seattle, it was like Christmas morning. To watch each file was thrilling—to see what they chose to focus on. Ram Kumar witnessing electricity’s arrival in the village of his childhood. Sarita and Rashmita, inseparable sisters, free for the first time as young women going to school in Kathmandu.
After watching Literate, all three cinematographers reported feeling the film is not yet complete. They loved filming and felt it empowering. They would like to film more, especially if it could be a paid job. (They did receive a stipend for their participation in this project.) The blocking issue is their very busy lives. Ram Kumar and Rashmita work six long days a week and have only Saturdays to do their housework. Sarita is now married and is newly a mother.
Our experience of exploring cultural geography is from a documentary film lens. Our plan is to continue this project with the next step of including the Darnal siblings in the editing process. This to us would be a further dive into this film collaboration. How would they arrange and now comment on the scenes they filmed? What would they say about this footage now that they are older, post-pandemic and calling Kathmandu home?"