After a visit to the Afghan Film Archive in 2012, Goshka Macuga acquired a series of 35mm cut-offs, sent to her via post. Surprisingly they consisted of 19 separate film rolls of censored violent and sexually explicit scenes. Non-Consensual Act (in progress) proposes to re-edit and recontextualise this material and in doing so it reflects on the representation of intimacy, violence, and gender discrimination and its cultural significances.

Diana Baldon: At the outset of Non-Consensual Act (in progress) you asked the Afghan Film Archive in Kabul if you could purchase out-takes from 35 mm film that had been cut off for being out of focus. Your expectation was to get abstract images in search of interpretations, or longing for meaning. Why?

Goshka Macuga: During my visit to the Afghan Film Archive I was told that during the digitisation process of the films blurred sequences, beginnings and ends of the film reels, and the ends were cut-out and thrown away. I asked the staff of the Afghan Film Archive to keep all this material for me. This what I was expecting to receive.I did not specifically asked them for blurred images but understood that this was all that would be available. If I had received what we had orginally agreed to, the nature of the material would have been much more open to interpretation. This, of course, was not the case with the footage that was actually sent to me.

DB: Prior to beginning Non-Consensual Act (in progress), you faced a dilemma. This was posed by the many questions arisen with the surprising findings of sexually explicit scenes from not only Afghan films but also Bollywood and Hollywood mainstream cinema that you found in the material that was sent to you by the Afghan Film Archive. I remember your ambivalence and frustration in trying to decipher your messenger’s intention. In what way is the film attempting to deal with the issues raised by the material you received?

GM: The actual process prior to editing the footage involved two main stages of development: first I had to recognize where the film sequences that I had received were taken from, secondly I tried to uncover the possible geographic location of each of the scenes. We looked into a vast array of research materials, from film documentaries to journalists reports. These dealt with the representation of sex in film and how it differentiates according to cultural and geographical contexts; rape cases in Western, Asian, and Middle Eastern countries; how different readings of Sharia Law have affected women and men and the political ruling in specific Islamic countries, and of course the situation of women in Afghanistan in the time and the context of the most recent Afghan War. Our research was as much a process of trying to understand why the footage had been sent to us as it was an attempt to understand what it represented.

Having quite a short time to make the film we felt that our knowledge of such a large field was limited and fragmented but I still decided to go ahead make the film and present it as a work in progress.

DB: It is not often that you bring your own voice into your work. However, it is present in Non-Consensual Act (in progress). If your perspective appears almost vulnerable, in its spontaneous intimacy, while watching the film it becomes clear that this is a sophisticated narrative construct that blurs the boundaries not of the the dichotomy reality-fiction but those of the private-public. What brought you to this decision?

GM: Going back to your previous question, the footage I was sent by the Afghan Film Archive did indeed create a dilemma for me. I addressed this through the voice-over on the film that, whilst revealing my honest confusion about the package that I received, narrates my thoughts and reframes the footage around my attempts to understand the situation. I initially attempted to have some dialogue with the sender, as to question why and where the offcuts were taken from, but I received no answers. I then decided to apply different possible interpretations and readings of each film sequence, while addressing the collection of reels as part of a broader context.

DB: You titled this film Non-Consensual Act (in progress) because you felt the necessity of re-editing and complete the film, since the little time to produce it didn’t enable you to process all the field of inquiry it unleashed. Two years later, is this still a need?

GM: The need to return to work on the film is still there, I often remind myself of the necessity to rework it in the future. A moment I felt that a re-reading could have shifted dramatically the meaning of the film was when the foreign armies left Afghanistan, when in the presidential Palace in Kabul, Ashraf Ghani, whom I met in 2012, was sworn in as president. During his inaugural speech he addressed his wife by her name and praised her charitable work. This was received by many Afghan women as a long awaited sign. I also hope for that to be true but I also ask myself if this spark of optimism could be sustained in the context of ongoing political negotiations in Afghanistan. The situation of women in some parts of the country has deteriorated and no one really knows what the next elections will reveal about Afghanistan’s future and particularly the future of Afghan women. A second time I felt the need to return to the subject happened while watching the documentary India’s Daughter by Leslee Udwin. Many of the rape scenes in my film come from Bollywood, source materials that I now feel now should be addressed with more depth. In India’s Daughter the nature of the rape and murder of the 23-year old medical student from Delhi in 2012 profoundly shocked me, in particular the political reactions to the event and Udwin’s documentary. Indian authorities banned the documentary to ‘protect the dignity of women’ and ‘protect Indian national values’ with the further excuse that the documentary was commercially benefitting from the incident. Despite her appeal to the Indian Prime Minister and her ongoing campaigning, the ban on her film has not been lifted. India’s Daughter was nevertheless screened internationally on the 8th of March 2015 and was also uploaded on YouTube after which it went viral on social media. The response to the event covered by the documentary exposes the scale of the issue in India but also internationally. I guess that the commentary on iconography of rape in Indian cinema is something that is unfortunately missing in my film and should be readdressed.

Credits

A film by Goshka Macuga

Voice: Kate Kennedy

Assistant Script Editors: Kate Hawkins, Jessica Harrington

Assistant Editor: Jessica Harrington

Technical Consultant: Tom Balkwill at Dirty Looks

Produced by Goshka Macuga; Index–The Swedish Contemporary Art Foundation, Stockholm; Baltic Art Center, Visby