From Omeleto.
A young girl shows signs of leprosy.
THE BOAT is used with permission from Luke Morgan. Learn more at https://morganbrothers.ie.
Dhuckia is a little girl living in Nepal. Lively, sweet and smart, she wants to become a boat builder like her beloved father, Raoul, preferring to follow him to work and help him out when she can, rather than stay home with her mother and sisters.
The bond between father and daughter is close, and they’re loving and affectionate with one another. But when Dhuckia begins to show the first signs of leprosy, her father faces a devastating decision.
Directed and written by Luke Morgan, this Oscar-longlisted dramatic short has a poignancy and delicacy in its storytelling that captures the tenor of an innocent, happy childhood. The small, delicate details of Dhuckia’s life with her family, from the dust on the road to the textures of the boats her father builds, are captured with a subtle, poetic eye. The pacing, too, has the soft tread of its young heroine, ambling along as it soaks in the details of her home life and takes in the natural vistas of mountains and water that make up the borders of her existence.
But the film also focuses on Dhuckia’s father, and the development exploration of Raoul’s subjectivity also provides the narrative momentum, especially as he realizes his beloved child may be showing initial signs of leprosy during a fireside game. When he notices that Dhuckia’s feet do not feel the heat of a nearby fire, he knows something is wrong — and he knows that leprosy would doom Dhuckia to a life of social isolation and shunning since it’s regarded as a "curse" in her community.
Actors Shree Ram Dahal and Tejuswee Ram Dahal as Raoul and Dhukia, respectively, are charming to watch together, their close and easy relationship providing much of the film’s warmth. As her feet begin to fail her, much of the heartbreak comes not just from Dhuckia’s predicament, but from her father’s knowledge of its implications, which Dhuckia only has an inkling of.
Beautifully crafted and gracefully told, THE BOAT is based on a true story, and while it’s very much a poignant and poetic narrative about the love between a parent and child, it also explores the wrenching effects of leprosy, which still devastates the poorest and most vulnerable people in some of the world’s struggling countries. The tragedy is often how antibiotics and treatment can prevent permanent disability, but superstitious attitudes and endemic poverty doom its sufferers to disfigurement and isolation since they can’t access cures and treatments. Made with the non-profit The Mission to End Leprosy, it ultimately puts an emotionally engaging and compelling human face on what many still see as a "faraway" issue — one that has solutions to solve it, if there is awareness, will and drive to do so.
