Ep. 70: How to Breathe New Life Into a Classic Genre

This week on TIFF Long Take, Rob sits down with Indonesian filmmaker Mouly Surya whose latest film, ‘Marlina: The Murderer in Four Acts’, was released earlier this year to great acclaim. The movie, which follows a Sumba woman taking revenge against the the men who have wronged her, is the director’s Indonesian spin on the Spaghetti Western genre. Surya discusses why Indonesia, the fourth largest country in the world, has such a small national cinema, her earliest inspirations as a filmmaker, and why her apathy towards the Western genre actually worked in her favour when making her latest film. She also discusses the film’s imaginative score, how getting international financing has changed her approach to filmmaking, and how growing up in an especially patriarchal society has impacted her career.