Sun, 28 Feb 2010 08:00:51 +0000

“When the film Born into Brothels was being made, we were not aware of what was going on… We had no idea what a documentary was. We only knew Bollywood films,” Avijit said.The film showed Avijit at his home. Life here was a mess because his father was a drug addict while his mother was constantly ill. She died when Avijit was barely in his teens.The film-makers set up a charity called Kids with Cameras, and this helped the eight children who featured in the documentary to get help with their education.

Along with their schooling, the children were encouraged to develop a passion for photography. Their photos received a lot of attention and exhibitions were held in Calcutta and in New York. Auctions were even held at Sotheby’s to raise funds.Avijit was the star of those exhibitions and was soon invited to participate in a photo talent contest in Amsterdam, Holland. He was getting the taste of things to come.

“I am really proud of Avijit. He has done tremendously well, considering where he comes from. He is just like any other kid. He is always helping others too and helps us raise money to help other kids,” said Mr Kauffman.Avijit’s journey from Calcutta’s red light district to New York is a compelling story.

“Born into Brothels changed my life. In 2005, I watched the film for the first time, after it had won the Oscar.

“And it was the most memorable day of my life. It was for the first time I realised that I had a voice and people want to know about my life story.”By that time I had already learned to speak English and had been in school for some five years or so. I thought it was a pretty inspiring story,” Avijit recalls.

Unsettling change

So when he was given the opportunity to study in America, he grabbed it.He applied to American schools on his own, eventually getting accepted.The talented boy from Sonagachi departed for America in 2005. Kids with Cameras funded his studies in a New Hampshire school.For Avijit, the peaceful landscape was an unsettling change from the cacophony of Calcutta.

 
Professor Sean Hawkins (Professor of History, University of Toronto) introduces tonight’s film, My Neighbour, My Killer, a compassionate exploration into the open air hearings, which started as a social experiment in collective healing after the Rwandan genocide.
 
Award-winning filmmaker Anne Aghion follows this process — called Gacaca — and the impact it has on a small hamlet over the period of a decade. The raw anger and emotional wounds that may never heal are visible and difficult to witness. It becomes clear that there is no simple solution to reconciliation. Both the victims and perpetrators understand that the path to co-existence will be long and difficult, and this gripping documentary follows this journey with compassion and conscience.
 
Professor Sean Hawkins, tonight’s special guest, is a specialist in the social and cultural history of sub-Saharan Africa in the 19th and 20th centuries. His work has focused on such topics as identity, political authority, religion, medicine, colonial law, and marriage; these were brought together in his recent book Writing and Colonialsim in North Ghana: The Encounter between the LoDagaa and “the World on Paper”, 1982-1992 (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2002). He is also interested in the history of African identity, both on the continent and within the wider diaspora. This interest led to a collection of essays co-edited with Philip D. Morgan, The Black Experience of the Empire, (New York: Oxford University Press, 2004), which is a companion volume to the Oxford History of the British Empire. Finally, he is working on a set of pedagogical and publishing projects highlighting the African contribution to the Western idea and practice of freedom.
 
My Neighbor, My Killer screens at 8 PM at Jackman Hall, Art Gallery of Ontario. For more information or to purchase tickets, please call the TIFFG Box Office at 416-968-FILM or toll-free 1-877-968-FILM. Tickets can also be purchased online at tiff.net/cinematheque or in person at the theatre.