Sokola Rimba

I am keen on Riri Riza’s movie. I guess, there were only about 2 out 20 of his films that I have missed to watch. Those are: Eliana Eliana and Atambua 39^o Celcius. Before this day, the list are longer as Sokola Rimba was included on it. And now, I have watched one.

Sokola Rimba told about the life of Suku Anak Dalam, through the struggling of an environmental activist, Butet Manurung. Butet worked at a local NGO to accompany the jungle people facing the modernity.

She taught kids reading and counting. Her motivation, simply to make them be able to read the contract of land expansion. Commonly, people of Suku Anak Dalam didn’t understand the dealings. So much so that their compensation was only a few number of daily needs. Hence, their land of living were squeezing and converted to palm plantation.

One day, Butet was comatosed due to the hard way to reach jungle. She helped by a boy from the downstream of Makekal river. His name was Nyungsang Bungo. Actually, Bungo wanted to learn reading and counting as another kid of different Suku Anak Dalam tribe has had. Unfortunately, there was a belief that pencils brought misery. This dillema was also faced by Butet.

This movie was inspired by the real life of Butet. Though has done a helpful act to save the people of Suku Anak Dalam in Jambi South Sumatera, Butet felt powerless. She cannot stop the moving process of deforestation. On the other hand, forest was the only place where Suku Anak Dalam could extend their future.

There was a tradition of Melangun. It means moving from one place to another in the jungle. Suku Anak Dalam held Melangun only if one or some of their community member has died. If their explorable land had been converted to a monocultured jungle, their life would be hard. The Anak Dalams wouldn’t had a chance to gather food. On the other hand, their existence could prevent deforestation as their way of life was very ecologically sustainable.

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Tadi siang nongkrong di kineruku, baca sekilas buku-buku ini. Tapi yang paling disimak sih buku soal @garin_film. Baca soal film surat untuk bidadari, jadi inget film marlina si pembunuh dalam empat babak yang baru-baru ini juara di cannes film festival. Unsurnya ada yang sama: pembunuhan dan sumba. Di buku ini juga dijelaskan visi garin tentang pengembangan SDM perfilman. Disebut beberapa kali bahwa ia mempercayakan rivai riza yang masih 25 tahun jadi kepala produksi. Saya baru sadar siapa rivai riza setelah disebut di tulisan akhir-akhir bahwa dia sutradara kuldesak dan petualngan sherina. Ternyata dia @rizariri. Hehehe. Giliran berikutnya baca buku skenario GIE, yang ditulis "rivai riza" tadi selama bertahun-tahun. Surga pasti sesuatu yang berkaitan dengan perpustakaan. Kata seorang sastrawan amerika latin #filmbook #filmindonesia

A post shared by Rheza Ardiansyah (@rheza.ardiansyah) on Jun 11, 2017 at 3:25am PDT

Through this film, Riri Riza showed us one method that had been pioneered by Garin Nugroho. In the book entitled Membaca Film Garin, Philip Cheah stated that Garin Nugroho was made the first movie in Indonesia that was starred by a local actor and actress. The film was Surat Untuk Bidadari.

In that book, there was also information about Garin’s head of production, whom he was still at the age of 25 while making Surat Untuk Bidadari. His name was Rivai Riza, or we known him nowadays as Riri Riza.

According to his experiences of directing local people on “local tasted films”, Riri Riza was quite successful in delivering the message. The way Bungo told their tradition of honey hunting, was exhiliriating. I love the cartoon visualization on that part of the movie. And the decision to let Bungo dubb a certain substory, means that Jakartans movie maker, passed the microphone to the primary source of information. And that act of saying opinion was always be relevant up until this kind of circumstances. []

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