Out of Competition


DROWNED OUT

Country of production: UK, India
Year: 2002
Language: English, Hindi, Urdu, Gujurati
Mins: 75

Director: Franny Armstrong
Music: Chris Brierley
Editing: Gregers Sall, St. John O'Rourke
Producer: Franny Armstrong
Production company: Spanner Films
Source:Spanner Films
MCm Spanner Films
London
WC1N 3XX
UK
reception@spannerfilms.net
www.spannerfilms.net


Pick one:
- Move to the city slums
- Move to a resettlement site
- Stay at home and drown

The people of Jalsindhi in central India must make a decision fast. In the next few weeks, their village will disappear underwater as the giant Narmada Dam fills.

Best-selling author Arundhati Roy joins the fight against the dam and asks the difficult questions. Will the water go to poor farmers or to rich industrialists? What happened to the 16 million people displaced by fifty years of dam building? Why should I care?

DROWNED OUT follows the Jalsindhi villagers through hunger strikes, rallies, police brutality, and a six-year Supreme Court case. It stays with them as the dam fills and the river starts to rise…

"An inspiring record of a quite extraordinary campaign of mass resistance, at once angry, compassionate, disturbing and yet empowering, it makes for urgent and necessary viewing." (TIME OUT)


Franny Armstrong was born in London. She worked as a rock and roll drummer, and then became a filmmaker. She first directed the notorious film McLIBEL, which deals with the McDonalds corporation's libel suits against a gardener and a postman.

filmography as Director
DROWNED OUT (2002)
McLIBEL (1997)

Sunday 11-Apr-2004 7:00 PM Facets Cinematheque