
Sailing a Sinking Sea
US/Myanmar/Thailand, 2015, DCP, color, 65 min.
Thai with English subtitles.
DCP source: Documentary Educational Resources
Olivia Wyatt taps into the shamanic dreams and ancestral wisdom of the nomadic, seafaring Moken of Thailand and Myanmar, who have retained many of their traditional ways and beliefs despite modernity’s encroachment. Living on boats or in oceanside huts, the Moken describe a life with little separation between the spirit and the flesh. Wyatt’s camera responds accordingly as it sinks beneath and floats above the aquamarine dreamscapes, alternating between high-definition digital clarity and the dreamier wash of hand-processed color film. Immersing the audience in their magical, mythical reality, the film thoroughly explores the Moken’s water-centric world with dilated eyes and a liquid sensuality.
Anthropologist Robert Ascher depicts a myth of the Pacific Northwest Coast Tlingit using the purely symbolic, visual language of direct, cameraless animation. Positing an enchanting, engaging, non-Westernalternative to verbal, analytical methods of documentation, he also considered this approach a noninvasive method of portraying an indigenous culture.