‘MA - Cry Of Silence’: Busan Review

Dir: The Maw Naing. Myanmar/Singapore/France/Norway/South Korea/Qatar. 2024. 77mins 

The political grows increasingly personal in MA – Cry Of Silence, The Maw Naing’s punchy, heartfelt drama which reflects the daily reality of life in Myanmar through the ruthless exploitation of a young textile worker. Her decision to fight back lies at the heart of an eye-opening work that should find a particular welcome at festivals with a strong human rights focus following its Busan New Currents premiere.

A stirring call to arms for the people of Myanmar 

Closing titles inform us that MA – Cry Of Silence, Naing’s first feature since his 2014 debut The Monk, is inspired by women’s strikes that took place in 2012 and by the ongoing struggle to achieve any workers’ rights in Myanmar. Set in the present day, it tells of 18 year-old Mi-Thet (Su Lay) who has left her family in the countryside for a job at a garment factory in Yangon. There is nothing in her life beyond work and the brief periods of rest in between. Mi-Thet shares a room with two other girls and tries to send some money back to her family. Everything feels as if it getting worse; there are frequent power cuts, food shortages and rising prices to contend with and the workers have not been paid for the last two months. “I can’t even afford a bar of soap,” claims one of her colleagues. 

MA – Cry Of Silence depicts a life that barely feels worth living. Cinematographer Tin Win Naing (who also shot The Monk) paints Mi-Thet’s boarding house as gloomy and claustrophobic; a warren of misery with no privacy. The garment factory is all artificial light and rows of sewing machines. The shots of whirring fans and clock faces underscore the notion that these women are like creatures trapped on a running wheel.

The factory is presided over by a ruthless, predatory male supervisor. The Maw Naing keeps the threat to Mi-Thet and her colleagues faceless – he is seen in silhouette or reflection, his appearances signalled by the slap of a steel ruler that is used to assert his authority. Similarly, when a Chinese boss arrives to conclude a deal with the textile factory, he is never shown. 

The particular travails experienced by Mi-Thet are punctuated by radio reports detailing the wider picture of life under the military junta that has ruled Myanmar since 2021. The film is threaded with mobile phone footage of villages that have been reduced to smouldering embers and people forced from their homes. Gun shots are occasionally heard on the soundtrack, fires seen on the distant horizon.

When the bosses show little interest in paying their workers,  Nyein Nyein (Kyawt Kay Khaing) makes the call for a strike. The initial numbers are small and the chants are timid, but gradually their voices grow louder. Mi-Thet finds a mentor in Ko-Tun (Nay Htoo Aung), a student leader during the anti-government protests of 1988 whose back is still criss-crossed with the scars earned from his defiance all those years ago. Sharing his memories and his books, he makes Mi-Thet aware of the events that keeps repeating in the history of Myanmar.

The Maw Naing adds a poetic element with extensive voice-over reflections on the state of Myanmar and what the future may hold, although the relatively brief running time means that some elements of the story are a little sketchy. As the strike builds towards a shocking conclusion, what was an absorbing tale of individual growth and radicalisation is transformed into a stirring call to arms for the people of Myanmar.