Selected by HUMAN

On Saturday 28 March, Dutch public broadcaster HUMAN presents a programme centered around two specially curated documentaries: Cutting Through Rocks (Sara Khaki, Mohammadreza Eyni) and the premiere of Bagasi – what we carry (Emma Lesuis), followed by a post-screening discussion. See both films together for just €22.

Cutting Through Rocks

As the first woman ever elected to the council of her small Iranian village, Sara Shahverdi aims to break long-held patriarchal traditions. She trains teenage girls to ride motorcycles, encourages them to pursue an education and tries to stop child marriages. But Sara’s resilience and combative style bring her many enemies – mostly men.

Bagasi – what we carry

When director Emma Lesuis’s father-in-law hands her a suitcase that belonged to his late grandfather, Maarten de Niet, an unsettling family history is about to unfold. The suitcase contains an archive of photographs, political documents, newspaper articles and a double-faced doll: white on one side, black on the other.

From 1926 to 1953, De Niet was Attorney General and Acting Governor of Suriname. As such, he was involved in the arrest of anticolonialist author Anton de Kom, and the long-term imprisonment of trade union leader Louis Doedel. During this same period, Emma’s own Surinamese grandparents lived under De Niet’s government. Their worlds touched, but were effectively separated by power and skin colour.

Emma has Surinamese roots on her mother’s side, an origin that was rarely referred to during her childhood. At a time when the debate about colonial legacies grows ever more urgent, she decides to open the archive. As a film maker of Surinamese origin, what does it mean to investigate the colonial past of your in-laws?

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