Mbah Jhiwo

Yono, or Mbah Jhiwo (Ancient Soul), is one of the miners who carry large sulphur rocks up the side of the Kawa Ijen crater every day. One morning, his wife unexpectedly leaves the family home, changing a routine where time had seemed to stop. Since then, trapped like Sisyphus in an eternal task and guided by his faith in getting her back, Yono will confront similar events which will transform their aspect as his beliefs change from animism, to Islam and to capitalism. An ethno-fictional film which explores otherness and questions the myth of progress in the neo-colonial reality of the islands of the South Seas. (San Sebastian International Film Festival)