Orchestra from the Land of Silence – school projections

The Film Expanded in cooperation with the Pohoda Festival will organize 15 school events with the documentary film by Lucia Kašová - Orchestra from the Land of Silence. Through the project, the authors want to encourage young people to think about the issues of human rights and freedoms, specifically the current and in schools (in their words) poorly communicated topic of women's rights. Using the example of the Zohra story, they will introduce students to the difficult situation of young women in Muslim countries in the Middle East. The project has the ambition to provide a different, sensitized optic for refugees and our possibilities of accepting people in need in Slovakia. The Orchestra from the Land of Silence has all the parameters of a strong documentary form. It has a contemporary visual expression and is a combination of an emotional coming of age portrait and an engaged human rights theme that transcends the local context. The members of the first Afghan women's orchestra in Lucie Kašová's film are between the ages of 12 and 18, which is the age of release in the country. By issuing them, their rights fall to the level of a pet, they can be beaten, raped, or even killed by a male member of their own family if they damage the family's honor. We follow Maria - a violin player and through her optics we spend days at the conservatory and in the children's home, her reality and dreams. The girls are preparing for a concert in Europe. They come to Slovakia, where an unexpected thing happens: four members of the orchestra decide to flee. The situation is very similar to the one we experienced before ’89 in Slovakia. During socialism, ensembles of musicians, actors and athletes almost always returned from abroad in smaller numbers than when they left. "You will defeat the beast with the power of music," reads the logo of the film Orchestra from the Land of Silence. The project will be beneficial for young people, teachers and the public in general.