Flying Fish
(Igillena Maluwo)

Sanjeewa Pushpakumara’s film explores the consequences of the
26-year-long civil war which set the central government’s army
against the Tamil Tigers. The film-maker deliberately ignored the
grand historical narrative in his depiction of the fights that killed
almost 200,000 people from 1997 to 2009. Instead, he looked for
intimate traces of the trauma in the daily lives of several people.
Beyond the quiet beauty of the countryside and testimonies expressed
with few words, a silent threat constantly looms over the
village life. The film narrates its events through three interlaced
stories. Avoiding to take sides, the film is an introspective quest,
a work of remembrance involving the necessary rebuilding of
the self. Each scene illustrates how the director was careful not
to have a haughty point of view on history. The frontal approach
reveals the imperative nature of the process (holding one’s own in
front of reality’s extravagances). At the same time, it suggests a
dialectic relationship with the execution scene. The ambivalence
of the signs tells us a lot about the ambition and lucidity of this
first feature film and the emergence of a new film-maker. JB