Winner of the 2009 edition of NodoDocFest! www.nododocfest.org
Chiapas, South of Mexico, 1994.The Zapatista National Liberation Army, formed mostly of indigenous men and women descendants from the Mayans, started a war of self-defence for their identity, their land and a place in Mexican society. The women rebels also wanted justice within their own culture. Before '94 the indigenous lived like slaves in the landowners' ranches and the women lived under the orders of their own fathers, husbands and sons, sold in marriage at an early age and abused daily.
At present, the Zapatistas live in their own self-governed communities and are building their own educational, medical and legal system, where women are supposed to have an equal footing and hold posts of power. Problem is, part of the Zapatistas’ aim was to recover old traditions, and some of those justify abuse to women and gender injustice. The women are still fighting to preserve the traditions they like and efface the ones that harm them.
After Zapatismo explores the impact of this movement on the lives of indigenous women from Chiapas today . The protagonists are a Tojolobal family, whose women, inspired by the Zapatistas, tried to change their lives and help others to do it, but they rather do it independently from the Zapatistas. Other contributors include ex-rebel combatants who left because of the lack of equality inside the movement and others who claim to owe everything to it.
They all acknowledge that the movement and its women leaders opened the doors for their emancipation. But the hardest battles are still fought at home, in their kitchens and their bedrooms.
To explain the background to the uprising, After Zapatismo uses stop-motion animation with dolls of the Zapatistas that artisan women make and sell to the tourists. This “dramatisation” of events is interspersed with archive footage. This section contains the only bit of narration in the film.
The filmmaker then lets the subjects tell their own stories and show their own experiences, although her presence and interaction with the subjects is part of the documentary and of how the stories unfold for the viewer. The filming style has been very intimate and casual. Some of the subjects will appear with their faces masked and their voice manipulated slightly to protect their identities.
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Distributors and broadcasters for the 52 minute international version.
