37 reasons to watch

Winner of the Caligari Film Award at Berlin and Best International Documentary at Hot Docs, Canadian International Documentary Festival, and nominated for another film festival, 37 Uses Of A Dead Sheep has certainly been going down well throughout the world.

That’s because it’s sensitively done, according to Elizabeth-Jane Baldry,
the harpist from Chagford who played on the soundtrack.

The film tells the story the Kirghiz tribe, who got caught in 20th century
politics and moved from the Pamir Mountains in Central Asia to end up
settling in Turkey.

Elizabeth-Jane told D+CFilm: “Ben got the Kirghizs to re-enact part of their own traumatic history.” It worked well, apparently, and uncovered tales such as the tribe’s leader being offered poison or the bullet as a way of assassination. He chose poison, and after plenty of tubs of yoghurt, managed to survive.

“It’s worth watching,” said Elizabeth-Jane. “Director Ben Hopkins let the people tell their own story, and there’s the story of them making the film within it.” The score, too, is incredibly effective, of course!

Elizabeth-Jane is in pre-production of her next film, based on a Cornish fairytale, and her previous film Childe Roland is due to be screened in April.

37 Uses For A Dead Sheep is on BBC4 tonight at 10pm.

Posted by Cptn