INTERVIEW WITH THE DIRECTORS

What is the origin of the script?

The script was born during a research trip in 2002. We were intending to make a conceptual documentary about aviation in Mongolia, with its parallel arc with socialism. We visited a sanatorium where retired pilots were most willing to share their countless stories. We visited the nation's one mental hospital where we examined how shamanism and epilepsy have been intertwined for centuries. We discussed shamanism with shamans. We crawled around abandoned Soviet military bases. From within these seemingly disparate subjects, a story was born. But this was a story that could not fit within the constraints of non-fiction. It seemed only natural to take our inspiration beyond those borders. Motivating the film are not only the complex economic and political manifestations of change, but also the more evasive and intangible spiritual ones.

What is the underlying message?

The tale pivots on the relationship between man and nature and the actual transition from traditional to modern life in Mongolia today. The presence of a corrupt government (in the film) is a key to the story. Indeed, the community portrayed in the story is one in transition in which external market forces are impacting the traditional lifestyle of the herdsmen. Opportunists in power spread the lie of the plague in order to weaken the nomad's hold on their lifestyle and, thus, facilitating the relocation of this needed workforce to the new mines.

The political context, however, is secondary to the spiritual one. Central to the story is the Mongolian worldview, which is a fusion of Tibetan Buddhism and Siberian shamanism. Most Mongolians believe that every individual has his or her own personal connection with ‘tengger', which can be translated as ‘sky' or ‘heaven'. The sky is considered the measurer of truth and is the ultimate judge of man's actions. If ill is done by the hand of man then the sky will show its displeasure by inflicting a natural disaster upon the land. Symbolizing the sky is the sacred blue ceremonial scarf, one of the key visual motifs in the film.

The film is about the human condition seen through a Mongolian prism with its ongoing movements and tensions between past and future, between growth and decay, between creation and destruction, between the search for meaning and the encounter with the absurd.

But the most essential conversation the film should inspire is about man's fundamental need to rethink his relationship with nature.

What was the casting process?

Casting began in 2004. We made four trips to Mongolia over a period of two years with the primary purpose of locating the boy to play Bagi and the girl to play Zolzaya. We saw over 600 kids. We had newspaper, radio and TV spreading announcements about open castings for an international feature film. We started this process in the smaller town of Darkhan and the mining towns of Erdenet, Baganuur and Sharyn Gol, and then held several calls in the capital, Ulaanbaatar. In December of 2004 we spotted Batzul while he was on stage presenting annual awards for youth music in the town of Darkhan. His presence on stage was striking. We invited him to the casting session taking place the next day and, within the first few minutes, we knew we had a boy with immense natural talent. When he improvised some scenes with the actor who played the grandfather, Damchaa, he exhibited real emotional intelligence.

As for Zolzaya, we knew only that she had to have a fierceness that would translate to screen. No doe-eyed, soft-voiced, meek, giggling type would do. We needed a warrior. Again, like the case of Bagi, she didn't come to us. We found her. We were using a photo agency studio for some casting sessions in the capital. We were browsing casually through their books of headshots of models. We all were struck dumb but the image of one girl. We called her and asked her to attend a casting session. She was seemingly not at all interested at the outset. Some of the casting team dismissed her immediately as far too aloof and beautiful. Until they saw her perform. She had never performed in her life but her capacity to listen to instructions and then listen to and respond believably to those performing opposite her during casting left us all, well...speechless. The fact that she is physically stunning was a positive aside, as well as a very severe distraction for most of the production team who were infatuated with her from day one.

What were the challenges you faced when shooting the film?

The cold and the wind, naturally. And keeping seven nationalities functioning in some sort of harmony. The cameras were winterized (to perfection) by ACT/ARRI in St. Petersburg. We faced temperatures of -35° Celsius. This didn't happen too often but when it did there was little conversation on set. Everyone was terribly intent on getting the job done before one's hands or feet were doomed. During our first week of shooting the Mongolian government collapsed. This affected us only in that we had to postpone shooting scenes with military trucks since the new Defense Minister was busy visiting the bases and all trucks were on stand-by. We had initially been worried that local authorities and even the central authorities would take unkindly to our film and cause us some trouble. After all, we were filming men in virus suits, soldiers tearing around the city in jeeps, burning animals, burning yurts, animals enclosed in a  power station, coal thieves, colossal machines in colossal mines, a dead horse, suicide,...all-in-all not exactly the postcard-perfect romantic pastoralism that some Mongolians would prefer to present to the outside world and not exactly that sweet and sappy idyllic supposedly ‘untouched' world that Western movie-goers sometimes hunger. Yes, it is a provocative film. We offer no apologies for that. But the provocation should be perceived in a larger sense. We humans are causing so much destruction everywhere. It just so happens that this tale takes place in Mongolia and within the framework of Mongolian cosmology.

How close is your film to reality?

Close but far. Close in that many anecdotes are derived from reality, many sets are pre-existing, and, most critically, issues in the film are those that touch the Mongolian people. Far in that the characters are entirely fictional. There are issues related to mining that are explosively controversial in Mongolia. Foreign mining companies with vast sums are currently leasing vast tracts of land. They pay fewer taxes to Mongolia than they should, according to many Mongolians. Corruption is rampant at the top. Nothing unusual, of course. Viruses do strike, which cause the death of livestock. Epilepsy in the countryside is commonly perceived of as a call to shamanism. The abandoned buildings in the future scenes are of an abandoned Soviet military base, of which there are many still standing in open steppelands across Mongolia, too isolated to do anything about. As is obvious in the film, most locations are natural sets. Very little set-building was needed. The country itself offers so many compelling natural sets, especially urban or post-urban. And as for the sadness of the film ... the grandfather's personage and his monologues sum up what appears to be a common opinion of the elderly in Mongolia: that the young are losing touch with their heritage and that man, in general, has an eroding relationship with nature. It is a terribly sad film, indeed, but one pierced with light throughout.

Why should this film exist?

In answer to this important question, it is our choice to quote one of our closest partners, Mongolian journalist Nomin Lkhagvasuren. She assisted us in the research phase, the script-writing phase and in the initial training of the lead actors. "The very preciseness of the way the film (script) captures Mongolian cultural expressions, beliefs and myths, the crude and beautiful reality of living, fused with essential and universal humanity...make this film a potentially unique piece of art. I envision a silence falling down upon an audience after watching the film. Silence where beauty, harmony, courage and thought translate the film into our inner universes, allowing us to open up a space and time for an inner conversation."