The Heart Becomes Quiet

Documentary, 88 minutes, 1999

An exploration of how lives were changed by the Union Carbide gas tragedy of 1984, in Bhopal, India, the world’s worst industrial disaster.

The production focuses on seven individuals whose lives were utterly changed by the gas tragedy.

Included are Rashida Bi (a gas-affected Muslim woman who has become the driving force behind a stationary factory for Muslim and Hindu women from the gas-affected neighbourhoods); Hamida Bi (another Muslim woman who before the gas had rarely left her home, but who now is one of Bhopal’s most vocal activists); Harishankar Magician (whose injuries from the gas have forced him to give up his previous livelihood and take up the less strenuous trade of fortune-telling via an electronic astrology machine); Gas Devi, who was born in the Orriya ghetto on the night of the gas; Safaraz Danish (a poet whose first and only book of poetry was published in 1984 and who has struggled since then to regain his voice and to speak for his community about the tragedy); and Brian Mooney (an American who worked for the law firm that represented Union Carbide, but who has since left law and is now living in Bhopal doing anthropological research on the people of Bhopal and their perceptions of justice and systems of power).

Produced and Directed by Robin Schlaht and David Christensen.

Distributed by Maple Lake Releasing

Selected Festivals and Screenings

• Human Rights Project, Bard College, New York, USA, 2004
• Islamic Society of North America Annual Conference, Chicago, USA, 2003
• Independents Film Festival, Tampa, Florida, USA, 2002
• The Global Collaboratory, Syracuse University, NY, USA, 2002
• American Sociological Association Annual Conference, Washington, DC, USA, 2000
• Global Visions Festival, Edmonton, Alberta, Canada, 1999
• Regina Public Library Theatre, Regina, Saskatchewan, Canada, 1999
• Medicine Hat Public Library Theatre, Medicine Hat, Alberta, Canada, 1999

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