WIDE ANGLE: WILD WOMEN GENTLE BEASTS
Wide Angle: Wild Women Gentle Beasts
Wide Angleis our books and films segment at continnect.
Today on Wide Angle, we look at Wild Women- Gentle Beasts, a film by Swiss film maker Anka Schmid
festivals. Wild Women- Gentle Beasts will be screened for the first time on the 29th of July on Swiss television SRF1. Ahead of the screening, continnect caught up with Anka Schmid, to know more about the movie and the creative force behind it.
continnect: Let’ s start with the obvious question, what was your inspiration behind making this movie?
The
Story
A scene from the film © ankaschmid
Wild Women- Gentle Beasts explores the lives of women animal tamers from different cultures. The story unfolds through five women from four different countries – Namayca from France, Carmen from Germany, a motherdaughter duo Nadezhda and Aliya from Russia, and Anosa from Egypt. They earn a living by taming wild animals for circus shows. Their days revolve around lions, tigers and bears.
Anka: As a child, I dreamt that I want to be a female animal tamer. At that time, I use to watch a television series about circus and it featured a female tiger tamer. I was very fascinated by the circus. As I grew my ambitions changed and I wanted to be a filmmaker. But when I started taking my son to the circus, after 20 years I felt a connection. A fascination for this profession( animal taming), because you have to be totally passionate and it’ s different if women do it because you work with your body and you work with something you cannot tame. So it’ s this ambiguity. I also wanted to see how is the situation for women in different cultures working with animals. I wanted the movie to be more than a portrait of this profession, on what goes behind the scenes in a circus- The glamour, the shiny things and the hard work.
As audience we visit circus to be entertained. All we see in an hour of circus is glamour, shiny clothes and smiles in midst of loud claps and music. But what really goes behind the scenes of a circus? What does it take to be an animal tamer? Director Anka answers these questions as she tells the story of these women following them through their training days, the highs and lows and the beautiful moments with these wild beasts.
It took four years for the Wild Women- Gentle Beasts to be completed. Starting with the research, getting to know the women animal tamers, getting comfortable with the animals and finally to film and produce the documentary. Since 2015, the film has been screened at many film
Anka with Anosa © ankaschmid
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