The documentary follows Riya, a bar dancer, from her home in Delhi to Mumbai where hundreds of working class girls like her come in search of work and a future.
read moreSaba dewan
Saba Dewan is a documentary film maker based in New Delhi, India. Her work has focused on communalism, gender, sexuality and culture. Her notable films include 'Dharmayuddha' (Holy War, 1989), 'Nasoor' (Festering Wound, 1991), 'Khel' (The Play, 1994), 'Barf' (Snow, 1997) and 'Sita’s Family' (2001) and have been screened extensively in India and at international film festivals. For the past few years she has been working on a trilogy of films focusing on stigmatized women performers. 'Delhi-Mumbai-Delhi' (2006) on the lives of bar dancers was the first film of the trilogy; the second being 'Naach' (The Dance, 2008) that explores the lives of women who dance in rural fairs. Both the films have been screened widely and have generated critical acclaim. The third and final film of the trilogy is 'The Other Song' (2009) about the art and lifestyle of the tawaifs or courtesans.
Films with Under Construction
the dance
At the Sonpur cattle fair in rural Bihar every evening more than fifty girls take to the stage and dance for an all male audience with a barbed wire fence separating the performers from the spectators.
read moreThe Other Song
In 1935 Rasoolan Bai recorded for the gramophone this thumri – My breasts are wounded, don’t throw flowers at me. Never to be sung again, the song eventually got lost. 74 years later the film travels through Varanasi, Lucknow and Muzzafarpur in search of the forgotten song.
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