Sunrise. A lone tank drives into a suspiciously quiet war zone: a tiny rural hamlet, inhabited by just one family. For more than 30 years, Sri Lanka was ravaged by a civil war between government troops and the ‘Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam’.  There is no peace in The Forsaken Land. A fragile ceasefire seems to be in effect, but fresh fighting could break out at any moment. Loosely structured scenes from the everyday life of the family pass by in this void, constant tension and stalemate. Far from civilisation, surrounded by lush palm trees and pools of blood, the members of the family are caught in a suffocating atmosphere characterised by cruelty, desperation and absurdity.
This unusual feature debut by Jayasundara won the Camera d’Or at Cannes. He then continued to examine the wounds left by this struggle in his subsequent films.(IFFR)