Mogilino, lost in translation

Tue, Feb 09 2010

Fri, Mar 14 2008 16:00 CET byRene Beekman 1789 Views 15 Comments

Ever since the film premiered in September 2007, Bulgaria's Abandoned Children by British director Kate Blewett has provoked strong reactions - in the UK, across Europe and in Bulgaria. Bulgarian reactions have repeatedly accused Blewett of being unfair and manipulative.

The Sofia Echo reviewed the 88-minute version of the film that is available online at Google video, which appears to be a recording of the BBC4 broadcast to try and make an assessment of the Bulgarian claims.

The film opens with a 19-second-long shot of one of the children in a foetal position, rocking back and forth, while humming: "Mmm-mm-mm-mm-mmmmmmm. Mmmmmmm mmmm."

In an interview with Belgium television Kanaal Een (Channel One), Blewett says she asked her interpreter what the child was singing. According to Blewett, she was told it was a children's song called Dear, Dear Mummy.

The song she is referring to is Мила моя мамо (My Dear Mummy), which Blewett uses several times in the film. It, though, has a different melody, intonation and rhythm from what the child is humming. My Dear Mummy has a structure of six syllables per sentence, while the child hums in what appear to be five and two syllable sentences.
Two shots later, we meet Didi, one of the girls in the home. Didi says: "Тука са само увредени деца, не могат да говорят" (Here are only children with disabilities, they cannot speak). The film's subtitles however, translate this as "This is a sanctuary for the damaged."

Fifty four seconds into the film, the opening title starts.

What follows is 87 minutes filled with mostly monologue by Blewett. By presenting the entire story only in her own words, Blewett gives the viewer no way to verify what she presents as facts.

At two minutes and 40 seconds into the film, we meet Vaski. Vaski is, we are told, blind and diagnosed with cerebral palsy, "a condition many are labelled with here", Blewett says.

At eight minutes into the film, Didi, who is "mildly autistic but otherwise normal", according to Blewett, describes her relation with the other children in the home and why they don't play with her.

She says: "Тук никой не може да говори. Тука са само увредени деца и не могат да говорят" (Here no one can speak. Here there are only children with disabilities and they cannot speak). This is translated as "The other children here are not like me, they are disturbed". For the full duration of this specific subtitle, we see three of the other children in a row, rocking back-and-forth in their chairs.

At 23 minutes into the film, Blewett has asked for the medical record of one of the boys, Milen. Unthinkable in any medical institution in the UK, but Blewett appears to find it normal and shares the content of the record with the viewer.

Milen has oligophrenia. According to Blewett, oligophrenia is "not a diagnosis that is used in the West. It is a very broad label (again the use of the word label), created in the Soviet era. It ... was often used for the warehousing of dissidents in mental asylums".

According to US-based Center for Cognitive-Developmental Assessment and Remediation, oligophrenia is the Russian medical term for congenital mental retardation, with three severity levels and further classification into different types.

At 72 minutes into the film, Blewett interviews the nurses. In a dramatic shot she has 11-year-old Stoyan sitting in her lap, she says "I've come to see Stoyan six or seven times now. And when I look at him and I see, he is, he is dying, as far as I'm concerned." Blewett's word were translated into Bulgarian for the nurses by the interpreter who sat next to Blewett and Stoyan. Stoyan was blind, but not deaf.

The nurses tell Blewett that they are expected to feed and wash the children, so this is what they do. Later Blewett told Kanaal Een "I can understand how a member of staff would feel, well, I'm not being paid for this so I just do the minimum I need to."

Is the film slanted or manipulated? Although the film contains only small pieces of Bulgarian text, it does contain several mistakes which can hardly be accidental. In Bulgarian "увредени деца" is the normal politically correct term for handicapped children. To translate it as "damaged" and "disturbed" could be interpreted as manipulative. Repeated reference to Bulgarian diagnoses as "labelling" and the association of the diagnoses with dissidents in Soviet asylums is misleading and shows contempt.

Though nothing can justify what has happened to these children, the film would have made more impact if Blewett had just shown the images.

Rene Beekman has been a video editor, mainly for reportage and documentaries for television in the Netherlands, for more than 10 years.