The documentary film ‘Saving Grace,’ which is about plastic surgery in Pakistan, won an Oscar on Sunday for best Documentary Short. the film follows the plight of several Pakistani women who have been burned with acid after ignoring a man’s advances, getting into an argument with a man, or similar offenses.
The documentary features Dr. Mohammad Jawad, a plastic surgeon who has worked on many acid attack victims. his most famous patient, Katie Piper, is a former British model and television presenter who was attacked with acid in 2008. It is thought that hundreds of such attacks occur each year, says the Harley Medical Group. Saving Grace follows several women who undergo extensive plastic surgery after they are disfigured by acid attacks.
In her acceptance speech, co-director Sharmeen Obaid Chinoy said “All the women in Pakistan working for change, don’t give up on your dreams, this is for you.” she hopes that the film will reduce the number of women attacked in this disfiguring manner. Dr. Jawad commented “The women who decided to be a part of the documentary did so because they wanted to make their voices heard and wanted to bring attention to this form of assault… the main reason that they are in Saving Face is to make their stories heard and have an impact.”
Yesterday, approximately a month after the documentary Saving Face won an Oscar for best short film, a victim of an acid attack, Fakhra Yunus committed suicide. Saving Face explored acid attacks, and how they affect women across the world, including in Pakistan. in short, the film follows two Pakistani women as they reconstruct their lives and bodies with the help of a UK-based plastic surgeon, As some point out, despite the hopes raised by the film, Fakhra’s death is a reality check.
The reasons why Fakhra took her life are complex and cannot be reduced to the denial of justice that occurred with the 2002 acquittal of her ex-husband, Bilal Khar, an ex-member of Parliament and son of a former Punjab governor. The plain fact is that Fakhra was emotionally and physically devastated by her attack; no amount of plastic surgery could ‘save’ her, and heal her trauma. As a prominent Pakistaniactivist observed after her death,
“At the young age of 22 an acid attack left her only marginally alive, her horrific mutilation disfigured her so completely that she was confronted by open disgust and contempt by everyone who set eyes on her in Pakistan. she became a liability to her own family for whom she was once a source of income”.
A bill was recently passed in the Pakistani parliament that sentences perpetrators of acid attacks to between 14 years and life in prison, and a $14,000 fine. Legal provisions like these cannot, however, prevent the sense of unhappiness and barriers to a normal life that haunt acid attack victims like Fakhra. her death is a reminder that justice for the victims of acid attacks, and other violent acts against women, must go beyond legal mechanisms and address culturally nuanced questions that affect the recovery process. This includes ensuring access to plastic surgery and rehabilitative measures for women in the poorest segments of society, and addressing the complicated economic and social disincentives that women and their families face when deciding whether to jail the husband-perpetrator. for example, in many South Asian cultures, women without men are socially ostracized.
In parts of Pakistan where societies are based on feudal and tribal patriarchal values, legal measures may not be a sufficient deterrent for those who choose to commit acid attacks, as reclaiming the honor of one’s family or oneself may be worth going to jail. As the case of Bangladesh suggests, regulating the sale of acid might be more effective than trying to establish legal deterrents.
Fakhra Yunus’s suicide shows that for many victims of acid attacks, relief is not about ‘saving face’, but rather about living and dealing with the faces that have become their own. Fakhra Yunus lacked the support to do this. in order to ‘save’ these women, we must engage in a multi-pronged approach that seeks to prevent crimes like these from occurring in the first place.
TUCSON – the 2012 Oscars, which aired last Sunday, highlighted Plastic and Reconstructive Surgery on and off the big screen.
The documentary “Saving Face” won for best short subject documentary. it portrays the lives of two Pakistani women who were victims of an acid attack and the Plastic Surgeon, Dr. Mohammad Juwad who helps them heal. Off screen, the Oscars also stirred speculation on which stars had recent plastic surgery.
On today’s “Make me over,” Dr. Gwen Maxwell stopped by to discuss this further:
Saving Face – Directed by Daneil Junge and Sharmeen Obaid-Chinoy:• Airing on HBO tonight and tomorrow• this documentary really demonstrates how Plastic Surgery can not only be used for aesthetics, but can really help women to heal physically and emotionally from the deep psychological scars of violence against women.
On a lighter note, the web and entertainment shows have been buzzing since the Oscars about which stars look like they may have had plastic surgery, most notably Billy Crystal and Sandra Bullock. Dr. Maxwell weighs in:• Billy Crystal – it appears he may have had a brow lift and/or possibly too much dermal filler. the possible brow lift has feminized his face and the filler has made him appear puffy. He may have had a rhinoplasty as well.• Sandra Bullock – She looks as beautiful as always, she may have had some Neurotoxin placed which can give a slight lift to the brow. • Tom Cruise – He is aging extremely well. He does not appear to have had any cosmetic surgery.
It’s MORNING EDITION from NPR News. I’m Steve Inskeep.
RENEE MONTAGNE, HOST:
And I’m Renee Montagne.
There is a brutal form of violence in Pakistan, known as an acid attack. Women are the targets. They are disfigured by the acid, thrown on their faces by men – men they know. The attacks seem unthinkable, but a new documentary presents what happens to a few victims in gruesome detail. that film, “Saving Face,” is nominated for an Oscar. Sharmeen Obaid Chinoy is the filmmaker. We reached her in Karachi.
SHARMEEN OBAID CHINOY: The reason that it happens in certain areas in Pakistan is, if a suitor proposes marriage and a girl turns him down, then he says, well, if I can’t have her no one can and he disfigures her face. if a husband feels that his wife has cheated on him or he feels that he wants to take on another wife, and the first wife is not giving him permission, he throws acid on the face. and there’s a mindset that it is OK to be violent against women, especially if it’s someone in your family. Most times, the women are too scared to press charges against them.
MONTAGNE: Let’s go to the actual damage that has been done. and it’s very hard to watch. one of the women that you follow, Zakia, shows you photographs before the attack. and we see that she was very pretty.
CHINOY: Zakia, you know, used to pride herself in her looks, actually. she was quite a pretty young woman. and after the attack, Zakia’s nose had partially melted. she lost an eye completely. parts of her right and left side of the face completely melted. so she was so disfigured that actually she could not go out in public without covering her face completely.
And for a long time, Zakia did not leave her house, because she didn’t have the courage to go out and face the world. and that’s what happens. The perpetrators want the women to suffer. and Zakia has been suffering until she got started getting her surgeries.
MONTAGNE: Well, that is one of the bright spots in this movie, that there is some help. and a plastic surgeon, who you follow, who comes over from London, puts his skills to use on these women. and though he can’t bring them back, at least Zakia looks so much better.
CHINOY: Well, this is a story of hope as much as it’s a story of despair. this is a story about how there is a problem in Pakistan, but there are Pakistanis who are trying to solve that problem. It’s a story of the British Pakistani surgeon who brings his revolutionary plastic surgery skills to try and fix them women as best as he can.
But it’s also a story about how other Pakistanis are helping. you know, a strong female lawyer helps fight Zakia’s case. and it’s the case of how female Pakistani parliamentarians hear testimony of these women, draft a bill and send it to parliament and have it passed unanimously. so it actually is a film that shows that Pakistan can solve its problems if it tackles them from all fronts.
MONTAGNE: this law was passed just last year. and in the end, Pakistan takes a very tough stand – life in prison as punishment. although, I must say, earlier in the debate a supporter got a lot of applause when he suggested that men who throw acid on women ought to have acid thrown on them.
CHINOY: yes. but, of course, I feel the parliament played a very crucial role, and especially the female parliamentarians, because here is a country where you have women who are getting acid thrown on their faces and you have women who are in parliament.
And the women in parliament who are empowered and educated have a responsibility to the women who are uneducated. and these women took that responsibility very seriously. and when the bill was presented in parliament, everyone spoke up in favor of it. and it was unanimously passed, in both the parliament as well as in the Senate.
MONTAGNE: do you think, I mean, the very first case that went to court under this new law was Zakia’s. and her husband got two life sentences, which is, well, for her, so gratifying. do you think that this law will be enforced in that way generally in Pakistan, that other women who have this happen to them will see their attackers put away?
CHINOY: The hope is that the law will be implemented, because, of course, Pakistan has many laws. but now women’s rights organizations are pushing to ensure that old cases are reopened, that men are retried, that some of the women do get justice. It’s not going to be easy. but at least the first step has been taken towards ensuring that fewer cases of acid are reported every year and fewer women have to go through this.
MONTAGNE: Thank you very much for joining us. and good luck with the film.
CHINOY: Thank you so much.
MONTAGNE: Sharmeen Obaid Chinoy, along with Daniel Junge, made the documentary “Saving Face.” this week it’s up for an Oscar and next month, premieres on HBO.
NPR transcripts are created on a rush deadline by a contractor for NPR, and accuracy and availability may vary. this text may not be in its final form and may be updated or revised in the future. please be aware that the authoritative record of NPR’s programming is the audio.
Priyanka Gill is a freelance journalist and an avid art collector.she blogs atwww.estylista.com
The skin he lives in
Saving Face, a new documentary film has just become Pakistan’s first Oscar nomination. Priyanka Gill meets its unusual protagonist Dr Mohammed Jawad
Doctor Mohammed Jawad is surprisingly relaxed – considering he is the subject of Pakistan’s first Oscar nomination. I meet him in his Harley Street consulting room to talk about his role in Saving Face. Sharmeen Obaid-Chenoy and Daniel Junge, the accomplished creators of Saving Face, had earlier won an Emmy for their documentary about the child soldiers of the Taliban in 2010. For Saving Face, she followed the doctor as he returns to his native country Pakistan to reconstruct the faces of two women who were victims of acid attack.
I am shown a short, powerful clip. Zakia is a 39-year-old woman who had acid thrown on her face by her husband when she asked for a divorce. Despite the atrocity, she is forced to return to her married home, as she can’t afford to bring her children up. it is a moving, tragic tale. The story is unfortunately, not an isolated one.
Official figures state that 150 attacks happen every year, but anecdotal evidence suggests that the numbers may be in several hundreds.
Jawad is no stranger to celebrity. his best-known patient is model and television presenter Katie Piper. In 2008, sulphuric acid was thrown on her face, a horrific assault orchestrated by a vengeful ex-boyfriend. she was left blind in one eye and suffered extensive burns. The doctor responsible for her care at the National Health Service hospital she was rushed to, happened to be Jawad. The story was chronicled in a Channel 4 documentary called Katie: My Beautiful Face. The treatment she underwent was radical and as a result quite controversial. The skin of her face was removed and replaced with a substitute called Matriderm to form the foundation for a skin graft. Price was induced into a medical coma for 12 days. But the results were extraordinary. she resumed life as a model and started a foundation to help burn victims. Today, Doctor Mohammed Jawad is a trustee of the foundation.
Jawad admits that at that time he knew next to nothing about the horrific acid attacks that disfigure hundreds of faces in Pakistan every year. after hearing about his results another doctor told him that attacks were rife in Pakistan. he was already doing a lot of surgeries on children with cleft palates, he became involved in pro bono surgeries that restore acid-attack victims to some normalcy. his disgust with the phenomenon of acid attacks is palpable, as is his zeal to help. “it is an intimate, terrible crime, perpetrated by cowards attacking the woman in a very public manner. The disfigurement and scars make her a social outcast. My job is to restore not only her face but give her back her life and confidence.”
Jawad uses the facilities of Indus hospital in Karachi to conduct free operations 4 to 5 times a year. on each trip he sees 15 odd patients over a few days of intensive surgery. to date he has helped around 50 women. he intends to keep doing, keep going. he also plans to set up a foundation that can streamline the efforts of the many charities that deal with this issue. “I would like to come up with a standard process that must be followed to ensure optimal treatment for these patients. If a man has a heart attack – there is a classic treatment. We must come up with ways to give the patients the best possible care, at the earliest opportunity. this would reduce the need for revisionary operations” he is also training local surgeons in best practices and techniques. The funding for the operations comes from various NGOs and foundations.
Born in Karachi, Pakistan, Jawad trained at the Civil Hospital, and later Jinnah Post Graduate Medical Centre, after graduating from Karachi University. In 1990 he moved to Ireland, joining Cork University Hospital. Plastic Surgery was not an automatic choice for the young doctor. “I toyed with orthopaedics for a short while. it was the instant gratification of plastic surgery that won me over.” he equates his specialisation to Hollywood. “Movies don’t save lives but they definitely enrich them. I enjoy the precision of plastic and reconstructive surgery. If you follow a certain procedure, as long as there are no mistakes, the result is predictable, and the patient sees an instant benefit.” he continues to do the “boobs and lifts” that are the mainstay of plastic surgeons. But he applies the same expertise to help burn victims.
His emotional ties with Pakistan are strong and are evident in the affection and exasperation with which he speaks of the country of his birth. The level of corruption, the negligible spending on healthcare and the all-too prevalent domestic violence trouble him immensely. he speaks of the ‘jugad’ that well-meaning people do to circumvent the system and provide relief. “As a young doctor in Pakistan I helped organise banks of life saving medicine which would be given free to poor patients and also blood banks where the family or relatives of the patient would have to donate blood to ensure adequate supplies were available. even drinking water in hospitals was a problem. “But we managed.” he says with understated pragmatism.
The Oscar nomination for Saving Face has helped generate awareness about the scale and life-destroying nature of acid attacks. A landmark 2010 law in Pakistan now makes acid attacks punishable by a life sentence. this should hopefully be a deterrent. The first person punished by the law was Zakia’s husband – lending a Hollywood-esque happy ending to the documentary. One hopes that the documentary wins. Doctor Jawad will be flying to LA for the ceremony. “I am excited about it. it has been an extraordinary experience.”
Saving Face will premiere at the Human Rights Watch Film Festival on March 28 and 29th in London and will be broadcast on Channel 4 in April. HBO will air the film on 8 March
looking better: Jun Hong (centre) checking out his sister Hui Linn’s face. looking on is Chong.
GEORGE TOWN: Acid attack survivor Tan Hui Linn wants to share her experience of undergoing a series of plastic surgeries in South Korea when visiting her relatives and friends here during Chinese new Year.
The 20-year-old said she was looking forward to meet her friends and teachers from her former secondary school.
