A River Changes Course

Three Cambodian families struggle to make ends meet in filmmaker Kalyanee Mam's closely-observed documentary about cultural traditions and diminishing resources. Although they occasionally address the camera, most of Mam's subjects go about their business as if no one was watching. In a jungle clearing, Sav and her family live off the land by foraging for food and processing grain, but Sav worries that deforestation will drive them from their home. A Muslim family makes a living through fishing: the father and children spend days on the Tonle Sap River while the wife mends the nets, but their haul has lately been slim. Sari, the oldest son, left school after seventh grade to help support his family (many neighbors are illiterate, so Sari's education level is on the high end of the scale). A third family harvests rice, collects palm fronds, and tends buffalo. The mother has to take out a loan due to a poor rice harvest, and she is having a hard time paying it back. Khieu, her oldest daughter, leaves the village to work in a Phnom Penh garment factory in an attempt to help, and while food and housing eat up much of her income, she sends as much money as she can back home. Although the children here are old enough by necessity to support themselves, their families expect them to continue to contribute, even as the plants and animals on which they all depend continue to decrease. A troubling look at age-old ways of life in Cambodia that are increasingly unsustainable, this is recommended. Aud: C, P. (K. Fennessy)