{"id":7220,"date":"2021-06-14T12:25:42","date_gmt":"2021-06-14T06:40:42","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.nepallivetoday.com\/?p=7220"},"modified":"2021-06-14T12:25:43","modified_gmt":"2021-06-14T06:40:43","slug":"a-nepali-documentary-that-depicts-the-other-side-of-trans-culture-wins-at-an-irish-film-fest","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.nepallivetoday.com\/2021\/06\/14\/a-nepali-documentary-that-depicts-the-other-side-of-trans-culture-wins-at-an-irish-film-fest\/","title":{"rendered":"A Nepali documentary that depicts the \u2018other side\u2019 of trans culture wins at an Irish film fest"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p><strong>Kathmandu<\/strong>: A Nepali documentary that portrays the highs and lows of a transgender woman from the Terai has bagged the Best Overall Production at the Pride of the Deise, an Ireland-based film festival.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Titled <a href=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?app=desktop&amp;v=4fhCSNr8nRI&amp;fbclid=IwAR27gt6vpuGmAUZ7XMmqU-FN43Hvbvm1Zz8Gg5tC7P5go0JUWEg06Ft4OGY&amp;ab_channel=GrishmaGiri\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Blues of Pink<\/a>, the documentary tells the story of Sapana Mandal\u2014a transgender performer well-versed in acting and dancing. The documentary follows her as she performs in theaters and orchestras around Nepal.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The documentary is directed by Grishma Giri, who worked as a volunteer coordinator at the Kathmandu International Mountain Film Festival (KIMFF) for four years. Giri is 25 and this is his first directorial.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Giri said that while working at the KIMFF, he got an opportunity to watch a variety of films on the transgender issue. He found that almost all the movies on trans issue were Kathmandu-centric, mostly the stereotypical portrayal of sex workers. It was as if being a transgender person was to be a sex worker. As a native of Terai, Giri was well aware that the reality was much different. He was familiar with the lifestyle of transgender people from his hometown in Birgunj.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cI knew there existed another side of transgender people\u2019s lifestyle, one so often ignored by the films that I watched,\u201d Giri said. \u201cI wanted to provide a fresh perspective about them. So I made Blues of Pink.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n<blockquote class=\"wp-block-quote is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow\"><p>The documentary tells the story of Sapana Mandal\u2014a transgender performer well-versed in acting and dancing. The documentary follows her as she performs in theaters and orchestras around Nepal.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n<p>The 30-minute long documentary was filmed in Janakpur. It chronicles Mandal\u2019s story while she goes about her life\u2014from a broken marriage to an understanding relationship, from the desire to raise a child to not being able to watch the child grow up, from giving blessings to thinking that their life is a curse, as the film\u2019s synopsis notes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-embed is-type-rich is-provider-twitter wp-block-embed-twitter\"><div class=\"wp-block-embed__wrapper\">\n<blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\" data-width=\"550\" data-dnt=\"true\"><p lang=\"en\" dir=\"ltr\">The Best Overall Production Award goes to Blues of Pink directed by Grishma Giri <a href=\"https:\/\/t.co\/i0Hyb0rZER\">pic.twitter.com\/i0Hyb0rZER<\/a><\/p>&mdash; Pride of the D\u00e9ise (@DeisePride) <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/DeisePride\/status\/1402222380659978247?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\">June 8, 2021<\/a><\/blockquote><script async src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script>\n<\/div><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cThe lead character of the documentary, Sapana, is a representation of many other transgenders from the Terai,\u201d Giri said.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The transgender community of the Terai is very diverse unlike in the hilly region, Giri said. They have a certain culture and practices that have been an integral part of their identity and their work, which connects them with the rest of society.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Giri believes that there is a great necessity of producing works on trans issues. \u201cRepresentation of trans people on screens makes people aware about the ground reality and gives a more nuanced perspective on the subject,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-embed is-type-video is-provider-youtube wp-block-embed-youtube wp-embed-aspect-16-9 wp-has-aspect-ratio\"><div class=\"wp-block-embed__wrapper\">\n<div class=\"jetpack-video-wrapper\"><iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"Blues of Pink\" width=\"720\" height=\"405\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/4fhCSNr8nRI?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/div> \n<\/div><\/figure>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Kathmandu: A Nepali documentary that portrays the highs and lows of a transgender woman from the Terai has bagged the Best Overall Production at the Pride of the Deise, an Ireland-based film festival. Titled Blues of Pink, the documentary tells the story of Sapana Mandal\u2014a transgender performer well-versed in acting and dancing. The documentary follows [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":15,"featured_media":7223,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[9,1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-7220","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-life-arts","category-uncategorized"],"acf":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.nepallivetoday.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/06\/Blues-of-pink.jpg?fit=1280%2C720&ssl=1","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pcWLTd-1Ss","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nepallivetoday.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7220","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nepallivetoday.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nepallivetoday.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nepallivetoday.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/15"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nepallivetoday.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7220"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.nepallivetoday.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7220\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nepallivetoday.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/7223"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nepallivetoday.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7220"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nepallivetoday.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7220"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nepallivetoday.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7220"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}