From Kalamu.

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“Kum-Kum Bhavnani has made a film about hope and about courage–with women are in the act of creating a more just planet.”
– Susan Sarandon, Academy Award Winner 

“The world is a place fighting for change. Kum-Kum Bhavnani’s ‘The Shape of Water’ reminds us how to hope.”
– Jeff Zimbalist, Director, “Favela Rising”

“There is another globalization at work and that is the globalization of citizens connecting to each other.”
– Vandana Shiva, “The Shape of Water”

Filmed over four years on three continents, THE SHAPE OF WATER (70 minutes, February 2006:) is an inspirational testament to grassroots activism.

SHAPE skilfully interweaves the stories of women such as Khady (Senegal), Oraiza (Brazil), Bilkusben (India), Dona Antonia (Brazil), Gila (Jerusalem) and Vandana Shiva (India) — seeking to end oppressive
social, political, and economic practices in remote corners of the world.

The women are abandoning female genital mutilation, tapping for rubber to protect the rainforest, protecting the biodiversity of the planet and opposing military occupation. THE SHAPE OF WATER offers a unique view of the realities and visions of the women through their passion to create a more just world.

The film works very well in classes that discuss
globalization and development, women’s issues
and struggles, and the daily life of women in Latin America, Africa, Asia and in the Middle East. The film allows the abstract and pervasive issue of globalisation to become comprehensible in human terms, and on a local scale.

Class discussion topics could include the various impacts of globalization (on the rainforest, the wisdom of large dams, biodiversity in agricultural practices) and how and why people are moved to make changes in their lives.

I have also used the film to make links between plastic surgery in the US and FGM in other parts of the world.

Narrated by Susan Sarandon, the documentary has already won several awards — Best Feature Documentary (Reel Sisters of the Diaspora, Brooklyn), Best Director, Documentary (San Francisco Women’s Film Festival),
and World Cinema Award (DC Independent Film Festival) amongst others. It has also screened around the United States and in Trinidad, Rome, Barcelona, Durban, Vancouver, the UK and Ankara.

THE SHAPE OF WATER is now available for individual and institutional purchase from http://www.theshapeofwatermovie.com/.
If you are interested in knowing more, please do go to the website where you can see a three-minute trailer of the film.

Best wishes,

Kum-Kum Bhavnani, Producer/Director
http://www.theshapeofwatermovie.com/