A Narmada Diary
October 14

For the government and the elite, the Sardar Sarovar dam in western India is a triumph of industrialization and "progress." For the Adivasis (indigenous people), farmers and fisherfolk living along the Narmada River, it is a disaster. As the dam rises, it has flooded thousands of acres of forest and fertile land, displacing hundreds of thousands of people. Many vow to drown rather than be moved. Combining politics, ethnography, and environmentalism, the film presents anti-dam protesters galvanizing a grassroots movement by walking from village to village, along with beautiful footage of Adivasi rituals and images of the surreal landscape created by the dam: submerged temples, drowned trees.

—Juliet Clark

• Photographed by Dhuru, Patwardhan. (60 mins, In English and Hindi with English subtitles, Color, Beta, From First Run/Icarus)

Followed by:

Fishing: In the Sea of Greed
Anand (Patwardhan, India 1998).
Fishing: In the Sea of Greed is an indictment of factory fishing and other "rape and run" industries that have led to economic and environmental destruction in India and elsewhere. Along the coast of southern India, huge foreign ships now troll waters that once supported small fishermen; in Bangladesh, large-scale shrimp aquaculture has polluted water and salinated farmland, with the endorsement of the World Bank. Patwardhan follows members of a fishworkers' union as they stage a protest blockade of Bombay Harbor, their boats dwarfed by the floating factories. As a union song says, they are struggling against the tide. Meanwhile, advertising images of happy Westerners enjoying cheap shrimp dinners make clear what drives the devastation.-Juliet Clark. Photographed by Patwardhan. (45 mins, In English and Hindi with English subtitles, Color, Video, From First Run/Icarus) (Total running time: 102 mins)