What goes through a woman when they're staring at her breasts

And other questions come answered through films being screened at Public Service Broadcasting Trust's latest fest in town

Controversy and curiosity. Two words that make the world work wonders, in either order, even disorder. Open Frame, the ninth edition of Public Service Broadcasting Trust's (PSBT) annual international film festival, aims to screen some shows that explore the most mysterious and misunderstood of human occurrings, like the intricate relationship that women share with conflict and peace, among others. The fairer sex has long dealt with justice unfairly, with conflictsu00a0 of all sorts haunting them constantly.
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This year's theme is an attempt to portray this struggle and its complexities, in order to help participants comprehend and change likewise.



Making a clean breast of things
Divya Sachar, an alumnus of Film and Television Institute of India, Pune, is showcasing 'A Short Film About', a look at how some urban Indian women view their breasts. Affected by other's perceptions, women mostly find themselves looking at their breasts through a male perspective, she finds. Whether in the form of media images of impossible perfection or an adolescent need to gain male approval and attention or just the oppositeu00a0 to repel male advances the male gaze is ever present in one form or the other, suggest her production.

African atrocities
Humiliation is another subject that has been extensively delved into. Veteran documentarian Lisa F Jackson, who has to credit Emmy awards and Golden Eagles, puts up her latest, 'The Greatest Silence Rape in the Congo', shot in the war zones of the Democratic Republic of Congo. It is the first film to break the silence that surrounds the tens of thousands of women and girls who have been systematically kidnapped, raped and tortured in that country's intractable civil war. The filmmaker went to homes, hospitals and churches and travelled to remote villages in the mountains to meet rape survivors who have been shamed and abandoned. A piercing and intimate look into the horror, struggle and ultimate grace of their suffering reveals itself. Get inspired.

Open Frame 2009
On till: September17
Where: Stein Auditorium, India Habitat Centre, Lodhi Road
Ring: 24682001
Entry free

Catch these films today

2 pm
Shahida: Brides of Allahu00a0
By: Natalie Assouline
The Film chronicles the lives of women in prison for involvement in failed and suicide attacks.

3.30 pm
The F-Word
By: Marcia Jarmel and Erin Gallagher
A provocative look at the power of the word feminism. What does it mean to various people?

5.15 pm
Fighting the Silenceu00a0
By: Ilse and Femke van Velzen
During the Democratic Republic of Congo's seven-year war, more than 80,000 women and girls were raped. The film tells the story of ordinary women and men struggling to change their society. One that prefers to blame victims rather than prosecute rapists.

6:15 pm
Sexual violence as a weapon of war (Discussion)