It was the Director herself, can’t believe this night is: “I can’t believe that a movie has won about Menstruation an Oscar,” said Rayka Zehtabchi in her acceptance speech on stage at the Dolby Theatre in Los Angeles. The 25-Year-old has taken just the opposite as the first Iranian-American woman ever to receive the award for the Best documentary short film.

Now, the award in this category does not count in the rule to report most night events from the Oscar; in the case of the 91. Ceremony of the Academy Awards hides in the niche is a topic that is too important to be ignored.

“Period. End-of-Sentence.” is called by the Streaming provider, Netflix, has produced a Short documentary by Director Zehtabchi, in German the very correct but somewhat cumbersome title of “the Stigma of menstruation”. Basically, the Film a group of women follows in the Indian district of Hapur, 60 kilometers outside of Delhi, working in a small factory for Bind. Only 25 minutes long Period is inside the “” to his audience and viewers insight into the lives of these women, but the impression is strong and he has for a long time.

Because “Period” is not only a Film on the taboo subject of female Hygiene. It is also a Film about institutionalised misogyny. A Religion that women during their menses are not to enter the temple, because they were then allegedly dirty. And a Patriarchal society, in the issues that do not affect men directly, in the Public simply does not take place.

at the beginning of the “Period” collects Director Zehtabchi votes from rural India. You make the urgency of your Company. Zehtabchi talks with young men, the belief that Menstruation was a disease. And she talks to young women, telling that they have dropped out of school when they got their period. Every Time a long way, to go to the fabric you use to soak up blood, there, where you can see not a man: it was too much for the young women.

but more often, the Director met with silence. A verschämtes Laugh, head throw, silence. Menstrual the biggest was taboo in his country, says Arunachalam Muruganantham. “Daughters do not talk to their mothers, wives with their husbands and friends not to each other.” Muruganantham is the man who has invented a machine for the efficient production of Tie, the women in this Film. Only ten percent of the women in India use Bind, he says. The want to change Muruganantham.

The binding, it is in this Film a Symbol of liberation – in a double sense. What it is: a more advanced hygiene product. And by what it creates: the work, which can make women to become financially independent.

Sneha, one of the protagonists of the film, does not want to marry. Instead, you want to be a police officer in Delhi. Working in the tie factory, you financed the training. What drives Sneha: you want to be known under your own name. And not under that of their father. As a COP you hoped for recognition and respect. It is this point that leaves a bitter aftertaste in the otherwise so positive and empowering documentary. Inventor Arunachalam Muruganantham, the only man in “Period. End-of-Sentence.”, also the only Person in the Film that were her full name. Sneha, the woman who would like to stand behind your own name, it will be reduced to their first names.

Yet “Period. End-of-Sentence” is an impressive documentary, which will be able to re-interpret it in a few powerful images, what it feels like to live under the always male gaze in a Patriarchal society.

The award of “Period. End-of-Sentence.” is a stroke of luck for the Academy. With her something, what should you succeed in a better world much more often to reach the Oscars: real social relevance. They use their charisma to draw people’s attention to a topic that is still much talked about: Menstruation and the related structural disadvantage to women.

You do not should commit as a spectator or spectators at the end of this 25 minutes the error, dismiss it all as problems of the Global South. Even in our supposedly progressive Western society, Menstruation is still a taboo topic, mainly men were. You can see the straight up to the ridiculous discussions and indignation that have accompanied the introduction of Emojis for Menstruation. The availability of hygiene products, female self-determination and freedom, is also underestimated in Germany.

Maybe an Oscar for a documentary about Menstruation, contributes to the fact that one day it is not more incomprehensible is that a documentary about a topic that occupied a large part of humanity, a large part of life, wins an Oscar. (Editorial Tamedia)

Created: 25.02.2019, 12:38 PM