THIS PRISON WHERE I LIVE is a film about two comedians.
Zarganar, Burma's greatest living comic, has been silenced. Relentlessly victimised by the Burmese military junta, he is now in prison.
Michael Mittermeier, in stark contrast, is free to practise his art of humour and provocation as one of Germany’s leading stand-up comedians.
Zarganar has been jailed on a series of trumped-up charges for his outspoken criticism and sentenced last year by Burma’s generals to 59 years behind bars, now reduced to 35 years. The genesis of this film began in 2007, when Rex Bloomstein secretly interviewed Zarganar for 2 days in his flat, shot the cinemas that are prevented from screening his films, the bookstalls not allowed to sell his plays or poetry, and the makeshift TV studio where his fellow comedians rehearse on a stage that he himself is forbidden to tread. Footage which has never been seen. Michael Mittermeier travels to Burma with Bloomstein to find out more about this artist whose weapons are satire, films, books, poetry and comedy.
This prison where I live presented in Munchen Filmfestival on 2010 June 28 & 29. The Festival was established in 1983. Next to Berlin, it is Germany's largest film festival, with over 70 000 admissions every year. Over 2 500 film industry professionals from around the world and over 600 members of the press are accredited annually. It screens over 250 feature films, documentaries, shorts and TV movies each year.