Midwives

Life in Myanmar seen from the perspective of two women.

The title Midwives is snappy and easily remembered but it is less than wholly appropriate for this immensely engaging documentary film from Myanmar. It is, indeed, a film that features midwives, two of them, by name Hla and Nyo Nyo. But in portraying their lives we are in territory far, far away from the world of television’s Call the Midwife although this film’s title might be taken to imply the opposite even though it does not suggest a bygone era. However, what we really have here is a feature documentary about what living in Myanmar has meant over the last few years. By concentrating on these two women the film immediately brings into focus a major issue there, the way in which the Buddhist majority in the Rakhine State have turned on the Muslim minority, the Rohingya.

A coup d’état brought a junta to power in February 2021, but for some years before that action by the Burmese military against the Rohingya had become so extreme as to lead to accusations of genocide. Midwives starts at that earlier time but even then - and this in spite of Buddhists and Muslims having previously been peaceful neighbours – protesters would be on the march to decry Muslims and to denounce them as terrorists. In this context Hla, having set up her practice as a midwife, regarded it as her duty to accept Muslim women as patients regardless of the fact that some of her fellow Buddhists strongly disapproved. Furthermore, she took on Nyo Nyo, a Muslim, as her apprentice midwife.

Midwives is first and foremost a portrait of these two women showing their endeavours over a period of about five years. The filmmaker, Snow Hnin Ei Hlaing making her first feature film, is herself from this region and what has emerged is less a work about midwifery than a portrayal of daily life in Myanmar. We meet the families of both Hla and Nyo Nyo, but it is the two women who dominate showing a determination and a dedication that make Midwives a film about what women can achieve. However, to its credit, there is no smoothing away of rough edges. Hla can be tough and even use racist terms of Nyo Nyo despite both their underlying bond and her desire to treat Muslims. Furthermore, Hla appears angry when Nyo Nyo is ready to set up a clinic of her own. As for Nyo Nyo, early on she acknowledges being unhappy with her existence and it is only when a further pregnancy leads to the birth of a daughter that she becomes settled in her married life.

Well photographed as it is, the main virtue of Midwives lies in such factors as its honesty, its authentic feel for the place and its focus on the two women who, if not always above criticism, can nevertheless inspire us through their achievements. Being so dominant a feature of life in Myanmar, the politics and the violence of military forces are always present here, a virtual constant in the background. Yet this is not a political propaganda piece but rather a film which without frills tells it as it is. Indeed, it’s close to being a home movie in the best sense of that term. And that’s so even if it can also be said that it leaves one with the impression that if women had more positions of power there would be fewer wars in the world.

MANSEL STIMPSON

Featuring Hla, Nyo Nyo, Kyaw Kyaw, Kyaw Tin, BiBi.

Dir Snow Hnin Ei Hlaing, Pro Mila Aung-Thwin, Snow Hnin Ei Hlaing, Ulla Lehmann and Bob Moore, Screenplay Snow Hnin Ei Hlaing, Ph Soe Kyaw Htin Tun, Ed Mila Aung-Thwin, Ryan Mullins and Snow Hnin Ei Hlaing, Music Olivier Olary and Johannes Malfatti.

Snow Films/Ama Films/Eyesteelfilm-Dogwoof Releasing.
92 mins. Myanmar/Canada/Germany. 2022. UK Rel: 30 September 2022. No Cert.