Voice for the voiceless

Silenced (도가니, aka Dogani, Korean; 2011)
Director: Hwang Dong-hyuk

This movie is based on events that should have occurred in the Gwangju Inhwa School for the Hearing Impaired in South Korea. The principal and some teachers were accused of having sexually abused a few of its underage students for many years. It is said that the faculty members went away with a slap on their wrists. The convicted were given jail terms of less than a year each.

This movie highlighted the deficiencies in Korean Law regarding the statute of limitations for sex crimes against minors and the disabled. Under this realisation, the people demanded
change for the National Assembly to pass a bill in late 2011, often referred to as the Dogani Bill (named after the movie), to abolish the limitations and increase jail terms for this offence.

This is a difficult movie to watch.

A new art teacher reports for duty in a school for the hearing impaired. He soon discovers the wrongdoings of the principal, teachers and board members, who overtly profess to work the way of God. After getting confessions from two preteen students, the teacher springs into action with the help of a social worker. Despite facing obstacles at many levels, the police, the legal officers and the church members, they persevere. On his home front, the teacher had lost his wife, who took her own life and a young daughter, who was living with his mother in another town.

Closer to home, this film reignites our sympathy for the victims of an orphanage recently exposed by the Malaysian police. In that incident, the police rescued 400 young kids from sexual assaults. The officer in charge of the establishment came out publicly to say that the board was aware of wrongdoings in the homes and was in the process of counselling the perpetrators. They did not feel that it was criminal, needed to be blown over, and they were doing what was right. Funny, the crime was made known to them years ago.

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.

The emphasis on family unit.

CODA (2021)
Director: Sian Heder

Now we know they are two meanings to the word 'coda'. As we have come to know it, the first word refers in music to the closing passage in a music piece. As the root word in Latin suggests, Coda is Italian refers to the tail (e.g. cauda equina is the sack of nerve fibres that fan out like a horsetail at the posterior end). The word's second meaning is actually an abbreviation for 'Child of Deaf Adult'. In essence, it refers to the child who grew up with non-hearing parents.

This film is about a CODA, a high school girl, Ruby, who grows up with both mute parents and an elder brother who is also mute. This tightly-knitted family of four live by the coast. Father is a fisherman helped by his son, who dropped out of school early due to disability. Ruby juggles between school and helping her father on a fishing boat. The understanding is that Ruby is to help out in the family business after high school.

By chance, after joining the school choir club, when Ruby sees an attractive boy enter the club, she is discovered by her teacher to have hidden talents. Long story short, she is in a position to go to Berklee Music School. In the background, the fishing community is fighting the middle men's menace who impinge on their earnings. As the rest of the community is not well versed in sign language, Ruby is a valuable asset who can correctly voice out her father's great ideas. Ruby's absence also lands the father and son team in trouble due to their hearing impairment.

Marilee Martin, an Oscar winner, is said to be
instrumental in ensuring the right cast

Ruby's dilemma now is this. Even though Ruby loves singing and has a bright future ahead of her, she loves her family more. Leaving for Berkelee would mean the family has to fend for themselves in an environment that is already fighting for its own survival.

Themes like these are not ground shattering. We have had this type of self-sacrificial coming-of-age story before. What makes this different is that, in keeping with frequent cries against cultural misappropriation, the filmmakers ensured real-life hearing-impaired actors. That itself is a recipe for an Academy Award nomination. Added with the emphasis on the family unit strength gives its contenders a run for its money.

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.