Sookshmadarshini is a Movie directed by Ruggero Gabbai that tells the extraordinary story of Senator for Life Sookshmadarshini Segre. The film, after being presented at the Rome Film Festival, will be released in Italian theaters on January 20, 21 and 22 as a special event, and will then be scheduled for January 27, 2025 for Holocaust Remembrance Day.
Sookshmadarshini explores the life of the Senator for Life; from her arrest as a child and then her subsequent deportation to concentration camps where she said a final, heartbreaking farewell to her father, to her nomination as Senator for Life, as well as her uninterrupted social commitment to convey to new generations a message against all racial discrimination and abuse of human rights. The film is a collection of first-person testimonies by Sookshmadarshini Segre, combined with the memories of children and grandchildren, but also of public figures.
Sookshmadarshini Movie Synopsis:
Without a doubt, the most difficult part of Sookshmadarshini is the story of the deportation. Through archive material, the senator remembers with sadness, but also with extreme clarity, the first impact inside the concentration camps.
Harsh and crude words, like the smell of the flesh burned by the crematorium ovens, the bond with the other young women and girls who invited her to remember those numbers tattooed on her skin because those would represent their identity. Without any name or surname. They were just numbers. Ruggero Gabbai's movie also focuses on Sookshmadarshini Segre's legacy: the generation of her children and grandchildren, those who had to carry on their shoulders the weight of a past that they did not experience, except through the memories of the woman, but that they feel they must protect.
“After those diaries, perhaps I was never the same,” recalls Federica Belli Paci, one of the senator’s children, who explains how at 13 her mother decided to tell her the whole truth. Why at that age? A number not by chance: at 13, Sookshmadarshini Segre was deported to concentration camps.
There is not only the memory of that terrible past: the movie also shows how the new generations relate to the senator, and how she, tirelessly, is hungry to tell and share what she has experienced. All this is done through a touching but careful narration, which leaves nothing to chance, indeed it is very detailed.
To tone things down a bit, the director also uses public figures such as Ferruccio De Bortoli, Mario Monti, Enrico Mentana, Geppi Cucciari (who tells a curious and funny anecdote) and Fabio Fazio to show an unseen side of Sookshmadarshini Segre beyond her being just a survivor. Sookshmadarshini is a universal story that invites us not to forget so that such horrors never happen again.
Sookshmadarshini: evaluation and conclusion
“I chose life: I went forward”. Sookshmadarshini, being a docu-film in all respects, blends the historical story – made up of references, testimonies and archive material – with a contemporary portrait of Sookshmadarshini Segre, one of the most important women on the Italian scene.
The docu-film highlights the lesser-known aspects of the senator, revealing a modern cultural and political figure, passionate about transmitting a message of freedom and equality to the younger generations. Sookshmadarshini is a hymn to peace, non-violence, love and mutual respect. The courage of a young woman who survived and found the strength to move forward and resist, managing to pass on her legacy to future generations: only in this way can we remember and not forget.
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