Project Kashmir is a documentary that explores various aspects of the conflict: Brutality by the armed forces, attacks by terrorists, and the cumulative impact on the lives of ordinary Kashmiris -- Muslims who live in constant fear and the Hindu Pandits who have fled their homes, and now live in camps in and around the city of Jammu.
It is not an easy film to watch. In fact, the visual impact of the contrast between the stunning beauty of the Kashmir valley and the brutal reminders of the conflict will shake up viewers. It is a conflict that has been extensively covered in the mainstream and ethnic press in the US, but the visual images and the voices of the Kashmiri people give the film a sense of immediacy and urgency.
Project Kashmir is shot by cinematographer Ross Kauffman, who won an Oscar for his work on the 2004 documentary Born Into Brothels. Kashmir was picked up by DocuWeek for a one week release in Los Angeles and New York in August, and these screenings will qualify it for a potential Academy Award nomination.
The filmmakers recall how they arrived in Srinagar when the summer capital of the state of Jammu and Kashmir was shut down due to a strike protesting the American invasion of Iraq. The cityscape was dominated by an overwhelming police force, but as they drove to their houseboat, for a brief moment they witnessed the unparalleled natural beauty of the land.
"There would be times we would go through all those difficult experiences and come back to the houseboat with the full moon reflecting in the Dal Lake and we would sit quietly for a brief moment," Patel says, "until we would hear gunfire from a distance. From the first day we arrived, there was always another tone. There was beauty and there was darkness."
Image: A Kashmiri woman walks past during a security operation in Srinagar on June 4, 2007.
Photograph: Irshad Khan/AFP/Getty Images
Also read: Militancy in Kashmir a lucrative business?
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