| Filmed on a mobile phone from inside Manus Island detention centre, journalist and Manus Island detainee, Behrouz Boochani, collaborated in secret with Iranian-Dutch filmmaker, Arash Kamali Sarvestani, to produce this film.
The result offers audiences a rare glimpse into life behind the security gates for hundreds of asylum seekers currently held in indefinite detention. We are offered first hand accounts of mistreatment, intimidation and the psychological strain that many detainees experience day to day. “He filmed detainees phoning anxious relatives, ambulances arriving and fences being erected around the ramshackle camp. Their intention was “to document the situation so that in the future no political leader can present a distorted narration of the events” (The Saturday Paper). The film’s title is a reference to an endemic bird that calls at a regular time – ironically marking out the days. The film is about 90 minutes long. |
©sarvin productions
chauka please tell us the time
Film “Chauka, Please Tell Us the Time”
Life in Manus detention centre filmed by asylum seeker. A poetic hypnotic film but also a damning indictment of a brutal policy.
