by APRIL FULTON
The little white crystals are on every table at every meal, from fine dining restaurants to roadside diners to the family dinner table, ready to bring even the most hum-drum foods to life.
But you may never look at them the same way again after watching My Name Is Salt, a slow burn of a documentary that made its North American debut in mid June at the Los Angeles Film Festival.
The story follows a family that moves to the saline desert called Little Rann of Kutch in the state of Gujarat, India for eight months every year to harvest the precious crystals.
But it’s not another sad story about impoverished workers; it’s a serious and at times joyful look at the people who have perfected a physically and mentally demanding job over many generations. That’s not to say the workers don’t face financial challenges, but the film focuses instead on their pride in doing their work well.
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Everything unfolds slowly, which is by design, says writer and director Farida Pacha, a freelance documentary filmmaker based in Bombay. The family is digging a ditch, then they unearth an ancient pump – is it for the field? Is it for drinking? “Once you give yourself over to the pace, you stop questioning,” Pacha says. Eventually, “everything becomes clear.”
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