The Exception and the Rule

How should one go about making a political film? This question was first raised just a few decades after the birth of cinematography, and it is still an important driving factor for a small group of film artists and activists who are aware of their medium. is a conversation with Karachi, Pakistan's largest city. Using small filmic interventions in everyday life, it highlights the unrest and suppression that is disrupting Pakistani society, but does not provide explanations. These confident filmmakers place themselves at the center of the discussion. Their film criticizes the standard documentary perspective in a strange interview in which the questions and answers are fixed, but their sequence is not. Techniques used include stop-motion recording, double exposures, and rapidly edited onscreen text, and these increase the grip on the audience's attention: this is not reality, but a series of 16mm images screened at a rate chosen by the cameraman. Film is not a dream, it is the tangible outcome of a range of actions and involves making a limitless number of choices. also examines censorship: what are we allowed to film and what are we not? We accompany the filmmakers as they pursue policemen, and we see a poor district of the city through the eyes of one of the makers -- facing the sun, he tells us what he sees.