There has been criticism, but I am fearless: Sumathy Sivamohan

“There has been criticism, but I am fearless, because I know that there is a silent majority that agrees with me behind the scenes”, said Sri Lankan writer and director Sumathy Sivamohan. She was talking at the last ‘In Conversation’ segment at the 23^rd IFFK.

The filmmaker, who is also a poet, essayist, and translator, uses Cinema as a medium to trigger introspection. “My films are all about making the viewers think,” she said, “All of my films are woman-centric. But they don’t go into their psychology. It is about how they are socially embedded.”

Her films deal with the Sri Lankan and Tamil politics. “You can change ethnicity by changing your saree. There is nothing in one’s blood, inseparable, about one’s identity. But once you consider this ‘saree’ to be important, wearing it in a different way becomes difficult,” said Sumathy, on asked about the sequence in her film where a woman changes the way she wears a saree, depicting a different ethnicity. “Cinema brings out the unknown in me. There are no good and bad binaries in people”, she added.