Cinema
Ranjau sepanjang jalan
Jamil Sulong · 1983
Synopsis
Lahuma and his wife Jeha, small rice farmers, raise their seven daughters on what the paddy field gives them. Attached to the old ways, they refuse the new methods and receive each blow of fate with the same resignation. But natural disasters and the pests that ravage the rice pursue them relentlessly, and the family must struggle season after season not to lose the harvest that feeds it.
Context
The film adapts Shahnon Ahmad's book published in 1966 and brings together Ahmad Mahmud as Lahuma and Sarimah as Jeha; it is produced by the actress's company, Kay Sarimah. Part of the critics reproached it for departing from the book, but praised the performances, which make one share the urgency of these hard-pressed lives. The same book was brought to the screen again in 1994 by the Cambodian filmmaker Rithy Panh, who transposes the story to post-Khmer Rouge Cambodia.
Who it is for
A rural drama in Malay, slow and harrowing; it can be watched without knowing the novel, which can be read in English.
Prizes and reception
Best film at the fourth Malaysian Film Festival, among several prizes awarded the same year.
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