WILD SCENES (PAKISTAN/2008/AKRAM ZADIQ)

Exploring the more sordid side of the Pashto film industry, Wild Scenes talks with some of Pakistan’s best known actors and filmmakers, as well as some devout religious dissenters. The ‘wild scenes’ in question are soft-porn sequences in which female dancers essentially lapdance the camera, often fully clothed. Some of the scenes are surprisingly erotic considering the industry is founded on Islamic values. Filmmaker Nasim Khan, while dismissive of the overall vulgarity of modern Pashto films, is particularly flabbergasted by these scenes and typifies the negative reaction which brought this documentary about. Another director, the appropriately named Anjum Pervez, argues that these scenes would not be so popular were the Pashto people not in conflict with their own value systems.

The documentary tantalises the viewer throughout with brief snippets from these ‘wild scenes’, but wisely spends most of its short running time discussing their cultural and societal impact. Pervez brings up the interesting point that almost all cinema attendants in Pakistan are male, painting the industry as some sort of inflated boys’ club (note titles such as The Pen and the Kalashnikov), and all the males interviewed for the film acknowledge some sort of religious guilt to enjoying. Though one gets the feeling that more could have been produced from such scandalous subject matter, director and journalist Akram Zadiq does a respectable and fair job of profiling modern-day Pakistan, and also encourages Western moviegoers to question the complexities of film censorship, and the hypocrisy surrounding sex and violence on screen.