Reviewed by Sunchica Unevska
Regarding the film "Bodkin Ras" directed by Kaweh Modiri, Netherlands/Belgium 2016
Anyone can be a poet, but they must suffer first
The film "Bodkin Ras" by Kaweh Modiri, winner of the "Fipresci" award in Vienna, is an extraordinary story about the escape, the suffering, the hell within and around, the loneliness, that mental place which terrifies everyone, when you do not belong anywhere. In "Bodkin Ras" the author will make quite unusual mix of real and fictional stories of fantasy and reality, a very beautiful place full of shadows, searching a way out until you realize it is just within.
In Forres, small town in the north of Scotland, a foreigner arrives, fleeing through the woods, running away from thoughts, from fear, from despair, fleeing from his own story and his own role in it, not understanding it. So begins the film with narration about pain, suffering, about personal torture and misery, about the place where there is no one, about the hell that is reminiscent of death. The mysterious foreigner arrives in a beautiful town, full of flowers, with tradition and distrustful but mostly gentle people. But then reflection begins, when everyone, like it or not, hears the old traditional Scottish song, which initiates the journey to a different surrounding.
The presence of a foreigner makes people think differently, reflect on their place, their lives, their stories, the city that gives a feeling of home. But what does it mean to be home. For someone it is enough to be with a neighbor at the bar, for someone it is enough to see the Nelson tower, for someone it is enough to be surrounded by all the familiar places and friendly people, for someone nature is enough. What actually determines belonging?!
Outstanding is the idea of Modiri to talk about the fears and the past hanging over them, which brings a feeling of anxiety. He chose to tell the story of Forres through real stories, through true destinies and tragedies that when faced with the presence of a foreigner take on different dimensions. Questions arise, confrontation as well, especially in the light of their own reactions when someone completely unauthorized shifts things from their usual course.
"Bodkin Ras" is an extremely strong internal story, which is in harmony with the beautiful nature, but also with the nature within us, the nature that remains intact as long as something does not shift it... This is how Modiri approaches this story, a story about people, but also a story about a city, a story about the sense of belonging, but also about escape from oneself, a story in which peace is always associated with anxiety, in which beauty is often able to hide disturbing things, until it loses its own shine.
Can a man escape himself if he carries hell within. Can suffering teach you to recognize things? Can peace and security of the city make despair disappear. Can belonging make you change? Sometimes a person persistently searches for peace and belonging, searching for a way to forget the pain, unaware that he himself causes it. Where can we hide from ourselves? Sometimes we believe that the borders will protect us, but they are so porous.
Kaweh Modiri makes an excellent movie for exactly that modern day paranoia of "foreigners." But, playing in a completely different way with what a foreigner means, what it means to be different, how to discover and accept one's own nature, because as the outdoors, it also can be quite unpredictable. The friendly city has another side, just like everything else, because isolation can never protect us from life and nature. Anxiety remains, the pain and uncertainty. The tragedy is inevitable, but why?
Because nature will someday come to light. Because man is as unpredictable as nature. Foreigners and distrust are only a need to believe in something so weak that is taken by the first storm. "Anyone can be a poet, but they must suffer first," says Modiri, talking about the "normal" things in the light and shadows of boundaries we set ourselves, constantly believing that way we will protect ourselves. Through "Bodkin Ras" Modiri shows us how big our delusion is.