Women Talking BBC2

[deeahgwitch]

Did anyone watch the film Women Talking on BBC2 recently ?
If you watched it what did you think ?
It had been released in to cinemas fairly recently but was not a box office hit.
It was based on a book based on an horrific case in Bolivia.

I saw it in the cinema when it came out, as I love the work of the novelist whose novel of the same name was the basis for the screenplay. It’s brilliant, with some extraordinary performances, but I found it triggering.

I would love to know what happened to the women and children when they got out.
My cousin as a student was volunteering in Central America a couple of years ago and saw a group from a similar “cult” in a nearby village. It gave her bad vibes. She said she got a bad gut feeling, it felt sinister, she couldn’t put her finger on what it was and she was very upset at the time.

I thought the film was good. Once you accept the slow pace, you get drawn into it, almost like you're sitting in the circle with them. The end is unexpected - won't spoil it in case others haven't seen it.

The basic scenario is true (the women and girls of an ultra-conservative Mennonite community in Bolivia, the Manitoba Colony, were routinely raped over a period of years in attacks facilitated by animal tranquilliser gas, and some men were at length arrested and jailed), but all the characters are invented, the conclave of women deciding to stay or leave is fictional, and to the best of my knowledge, no women left the colony en masse.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bolivian_Mennonite_gas-facilitated_rapes

The screenplay is based on Miriam Toews’ novel of the same name. She’s from a Canadian Mennonite background, and her novels often feature Mennonite characters. She’s completely brilliant. Women Talking is a difficult and painful read, for obvious reasons, but I’d recommend her novel All My Puny Sorrows, which manages to be funny and life-affirming as well as sad, and a rattling good read. The main characters are two Mennonite sisters, but who’ve long left their small town, one a concert pianist, one a writer.

Thank you @PollockMullet💐 I will put All My Punt Sorrows on my reading list

The youngest victim was 3 years of age and the oldest 65.
Utterly appalling and done by men who were supposed to live by a very strict moral code. 🥲
Are they all still in prison I wonder ?

I watched this on iPlayer and thought it was brilliant. I have also seen (and liked) 'All My Puny Sorrows.

Just finished the film - it's got two days left on Prime. I'm sure it can be found elsewhere. A slow, deliberate watch, it's a crystallisation of patriarchy and the sacrifices women make to escape male violence. I wasn't aware it's based on a true story (though unsurprised; it's not the only such real event) but it goes wider and deeper than that. Magnificently realised.

Hopefully with Jessie Buckley’s Oscar win more people will watch “Women Talking”.
The novelist Miriam Toews who wrote it sounds like a remarkable woman.

Ah, directed by Sarah Polley. That tracks, she is very good at choosing projects that tell women’s stories.