Masturbation is easy, finding the video is hard

Overview

Provoking the very system that enables independent political cinema from the Global South to reach Western audiences, this film interrogates complicity, surveillance, and the politics of artistic spaces. Juxtaposing the futile restoration of decayed 8mm circus footage from the 1950s against a guerrilla recording of a German cultural institution discussing restrictions on a queer film festival in Bangalore, the film critiques how institutions police radical art. The larger part of the film is an hour-long recording of drones over Gaza. The zanana often acts as both surveillance and psychological warfare against civilians. These drones, manufactured in Germany, is a reminder of the complicity of Western nations in sustaining violence while silencing dissent. Engaging with the ethics of creating and consuming cinema within compromised spaces, the film holds a mirror to the fragility of institutions that posture as radical while evading accountability.