KATHMANDU: Laxmi (Anisha Thapalia), is a 12-year-old girl, born in a house where happiness shines when lustful men come smiling at the doorstep. In this plagued house of the underprivileged people somewhere in the green hills of Nepal, Laxmi is under the protection of her caring mother Durga (Nisha Sharma Pokharel) who tries to ward evil eyes off her right from the beginning, wishing to make Laxmi a teacher instead. However, Laxmi’s ‘religious’ granny (Subadhra Adhikari), with assistance from maternal aunt Parvati (Sarita Giri), tries to influence her into the flesh-trade at a tender age, as they are under a financial debt to Krishna babu (Basanta Bhatta), Laxmi’s paternal uncle. After all, she can pull more money from customers to ‘nip the bud of her young flower’.

This is how Prabesh Gurung’s Nabarsiye ko Jhari (The Silent Monsoon), screened for the first time in Kathmandu at Gurukul on August 11, locates the audience.

The 35-minute flim, a post-graduation thesis that has also been nominated for the VC Film Fest Award in Los Angeles, basically tells the story of a mother whose failure to find a bright new future for her beloved child compels her to do something never imagined of a mother. The latter is given a figure of a goddess in the end, and both Granny and Parvati sympathise with her.

According to Gurung, the movie tries to urge women folk, especially of the underprivileged world, to break the shackles of domination and exploitation, “even if it entails a personal sacrifice”. Men can’t solve the woes of women, Gurung argued.

Regarding the title of the movie he said, “Silent Monsoon lends a kind of claustrophobic atmosphere, from where one has to be released, and which may turn out good or bad”.