Cinema
Kumari
Prem Bahadur Basnet · 1977
Synopsis
A Newar girl is venerated as Kumari, the living goddess of the valley, whom priests choose from Buddhist Shakya or Bajracharya families and who becomes an ordinary child again at her first menstruation. The film, presented by the Fribourg International Film Festival as the story of a Kumari, asks, according to Ratopati, whether a woman who has been a goddess can afterwards bind herself in marriage. In Nepal, a belief that the Nepali Times judges to be unfounded promises death to the husband of a former Kumari.
Context
The film was produced by the Royal Nepal Film Corporation and was released on 22 September 1977, in the month of Asoj 2034 of the Vikram era. It was made for a Soviet festival, that of Tashkent according to the film office. Salyan K.C. and Chaitya Devi play the leading roles. Ratopati calls it a cultural film rather than a box-office success. It was the first Nepali film subtitled in English, for a South Asian festival held in Bangalore in 1986. The film office has digitised and restored it, and still shows it in public screenings: the August 2026 screening was sold out.
Who it is for
In Nepali, 107 minutes, with English subtitles. It helps to know how the valley chooses and venerates its living goddesses, then returns them to their families.
Prizes and reception
The first Nepalese feature film in colour; it was named best film at the Nepal Motion Picture Awards of 1988, and Artkhabar says it won a prize at the festival for which it was made.
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