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Khamosh Pani – Silent Waters (2003)

Kiron Kher in Silent Waters (2003)

Khamosh Pani / Silent Waters (2003), a Pakistani film made mostly with European money, is focused on religious intolerance. Sabiha Sumar has previously made several docu­mentaries on the plight of women in her country. Silent Waters takes place in 1979 during the regime of Zia, at the height of fundamentalism. However, the film is not about reli­gious intolerance in one specific time or place, or injustices committed by one specific religion against the other. What is certain is that in times of strife, women are easy targets for aggression.

Synopsis

Atrocities of the partition of India in 1947, when Sikhs as well as Muslims abducted and/or raped the women of the other faith, are shown in flashbacks. Many families force their daughters to suicide or push them down wells to save the family honor. The protagonist Veero, a Sikh woman, refuses to jump into the well as demanded by her father and, like several others, later marries her abductor, accepting his faith and changing her name to Ayesha. Now a widow, she gives Koran lessons to support herself and her son Salim, an intel­ligent but misguided young man, a good candidate for Zia’s men to recruit to the cause of Islam. When the government authorizes pilgrimage to the Sikh shrine in the village, many pilgrims arrive from India. One of them is Ayesha’s brother. Anger and fear at the discovery of his mother’s secret pushes Salim further into the arms of the fundamentalists and he leads the violent campaign against the pilgrims to force them to leave the village.

Review

The film presents Veero/Ayesha not as a victim, but as an individual who is able to come to terms with her life. Even her final suicide is not an act of weakness but rather a protest against all forms of intolerance. The abduction scenes, which are shown in sepia, out of focus, flashback, are far from voyeuristic. Unlike countless commercial films that exploit violence against women for the sake of sensationalism, the main thrust of the film is the life of the victim after the incid­ent rather than the incident itself. Despite certain weaknesses in terms of the development of some of the supporting characters, Sumar’s first feature is significant in drawing attention to religious intolerance and particularly, violence against women in times of conflict.

Cast and Production Credits

Year - 2003, Genre – Drama, Country - Pakistan, Language – Urdu, Producer(s) – N/A, Director - Sabiha Sumar, Music Director - N/A, Cast - Kiron Kher, Aamir Ali Malik, Salman Shahid, Shilpa Shukla, Sarfaraz Ansari

Trivia

‘Khamosh Pani’ (Silent Waters) won the top prize, the Golden Leopard, at the 56th Locarno film festival held in Switzerland. It took everyone by surprise because festival-goers were putting their money on Korea’s Kim Ki-Duk going for gold with his film Spring, Summer, Fall, Winter…and Spring.

In addition to being awarded the Golden Leopard Silent Waters also received the Leopard for Best Actress – which female lead Kiron Kher shared with Thirteen’s Holly Hunter and Maria’s Diana Dumbrava.

Drama