Politics Never Eclipsed the Chicken

One of humanity's perennial tragedies is the tendency for ideological conflict to crush normal life in the name of justice. 2015's Kalo Pothi (The Black Hen) depicts the start of the Nepali Civil War from the perspective of a child who's just trying to keep a hen in the middle of it all. While people are harassed or killed by Maoists or government forces, all the time this boy just wants to maintain his little egg machine. Director Min Bahadur Bham draws influence from Italian Neorealists to produce a somewhat cold yet interesting film.

I thought of Vittorio De Sica or Robert Bresson when I realised most of the people in Kalo Pothi were probably not professional actors. Khadka Raj Nepali as the little boy, Prakash, is pretty convincing though some of the supporting performances are a bit stiff and sort of bewildered.

I can see why Bham opted for this style. A gathering of Maoists is stripped of any genuinely rabble-rousing energy to show us these are basically just a group of random people making noise. The camera work is also often conspicuously cold and avoids framing anyone in suggestive ways, often putting people off-centre in telephoto shots. Shots often begin several beats before action occurs and then wait several beats after characters have left the screen, as though the presence of humanity isn't worthy of any particular notice. Sometimes this does make one wonder if the film is worth noticing but it is a nicely apolitical portrait of an intensely political, bloody chapter in human history.

Kalo Pothi is available on Vimeo.

Twitter Sonnet #1504

The spinning birds required second beaks.
The chopper sky confused the muscle run.
Behind the palms we drank the island leaks.
A box of books can weigh a metric ton.
The bird was blue but not as blue as ink.
We measured days with candied drops of rain.
And something fell behind the rusty sink.
We think perhaps the map will lead to Spain.
The jagged lines describe a softer serve.
Along the cable, lights convene to eat.
The sugar road compels the sweets to swerve.
It's said the legs will end with people's feet.
The burger crafted well deserves the yen.
The chicken tutored well escapes the pen.