OPENING NIGHT
International Premiere

MARINA
MARINA: AFGHANISTAN SHOUJO NO KANASHIMI WO TORU



Country of production: Japan
Year: 2003
Language: Urdu, English, Japanese
Mins: 52

Director: Naofumi Nakamura
Script: Naofumi Nakamura
Cinematography:Takahiro Kameda
Editing: Hiroaki Takahashi, Kazuo Ota
Sound: Kazuto Ogawa, Saori Ono
Producers: Yoshitaka Eguchi,
Tatsuhiro Fujiki
Production company: NHK - Japan Broadcasting Corporation
Source: Fumina Koike
Media International Corporation
NR Bldg., 3rd Fl.
5-5 Kamiyama-cho, Shibuya-ku,
Tokyo 150-0047, JAPAN
Phone: +81 3 5455 5873
Fax: +81 3 3466 9530
koike.f-ge@nhk.or.jp
sales.micojapan.com

Surely some of the most shocking eyes in the history of movies belong to Marina, a young girl from the streets of Afghanistan. By pure coincidence, she found herself cast in the lead role in the film OSAMA, one of the first films from the new Afghanistan. This is Marina's true story.

Soon after the fall of the Taliban, Afghani filmmaker Siddiq Barmak returned to Kabul to make a film. The city was, of course, destroyed. The people were frightened and cautious. And, on the streets, were scores of children, begging for something. Barmak looked and looked for a girl to cast in the lead role. No one satisfied him.

Then, one day, Marina Golbahari begged some money of him. Her eyes and her face caught Barmak's - eyes and a face that had clearly seen more suffering in her few years than most people would see in ten lifetimes. Barmak found his star.

In MARINA, a small crew from Japan's NHK television depicts Marina's life, and the making of OSAMA, with startling candor and sensitivity. The relationship between Barmak and Marina evolves in extraordinary dimensions, as she adjusts to the new life, and as he adjusts his story to follow more closely Marina's own story.

Heartbreaking and powerful, MARINA makes one wonder whether the new Afghanistan will be much different than the old Afghanistan...


Naofumi Nakamura was born in 1969. He joined Japanese television station NHK in 1994. In 1998, he began working in the News Division, and has since directed numerous documentaries, including about sports (especially running), and more recently, about war and peace - especially in Afghanistan.

filmography as director
MARINA (2003)
IRAQ SENSE (2003)
AFGHANISTAN (2003)
AFGHANISTAN'S NATIONAL BROADCASTER (2002)

Producer Masaru Yoneno in person!

Thursday 01-Apr-2004 7:00 PM DOC FESTIVAL
screening with DEATH IN GAZA