The Forgotten Woman
Following the international success of Deepa Mehta's Oscar-nominated film Water, which has achieved, to date, sales of over $15 million and more than 1,000,000 viewers, Ms. Mehta received thousands of letters from the audience. Set in 1938 Colonial India against Mahatma Gandhi's rise to power, Water is about eight-year-old child bride Chuyia, who is widowed and sent to an ashram where Hindu widows must live out their remaining days in penitence. After viewing the film, many wanted to know more about the state of widows in India today.
The Forgotten Woman was made in direct response to this interest and aims to bring about an understanding of the destitution and marginalization of many of the millions of widows in India today, who are forced by age-old traditions to live out their remaining years isolated from and shunned by the society at large.
The film explores how these widows, coerced by their families to give up their possessions, become non-entities in society.
The Forgotten Woman aims to create greater awareness of the fact that in the 21st century, there are still numerous and wide spread issues surrounding women's search for economic independence in order to attain a modicum of dignity, self-sufficiency and basic human dignity.
| Director: | Dilip Mehta |
| Studio: | Mongrel Media |
| Producer(s): | David Hamilton, Noemi Weis |
| Writer(s): | Deepa Mehta |
