Numafung is a film review made by Kesang Sherpa. Numafung is a Limb word. It means a beautiful flower. The film portraits the culture and tradition of the Limbu community in Nepal. It highlights the existing traditions in the ethnic community and its impacts on life.
The film is based on real-life condition of Limbu people who reside in the eastern hills of Nepal. It has tried to give the real flavor of Limbu tradition and culture. The majority of shooting took place at Pachtar district of Nepal where the ethnic groups mostly reside.
The film tells the story of a girl namely Numafung. She is married off twice to men of her parents' choice. But she doesn't have a good relationship with her second husband Girihang. He heats her when he gets drunk. So she leaves her husband. But the family falls in the problem of paying back Sunaulirupauli (bride price) to Girihang. According to their custom, Numa's parents must pay three times the original bride price.
The film shows the real custom and culture of Limbus. Numafung is made partly in the ethnic Limbu language and mostly in the national Nepali language. In the film, thee characters in old age speak in Limbu and the young ones reply in Nepali language. It shows the linguistics gap in old and young generation. The film has three levels of audiences viz. international, national and ethnic communities.
According to the director of Numafung Mr. Nabin Subba, the two main reasons for making the film are to represent minority ethnic groups and to create a distinctly Nepali film with Nepaliness. Despite the international exposure, the film didn't hit the box office. It's because Nepali films with ethnic subjects are not commercially viable. Filmmakers like Nabin Subba are accused by the mainstream society of toying the ethnic line. Ethnic community members claim that Subba has betrayed the ethnic sentiment by catering his film to mainstream society.
The writer categorizes Nepali cinema into two. They are commercial Cinema and Alternative Cinema. Films made in the Bollywood tradition i.e, five songs sequences interspersed with three fight and two rape scenes are considered commercial cinema and outside this tradition would be alternative cinema.
Nepali film industry has been blamed for copying Indian cinemas. Hence, the films should be based on typically Nepali culture and tradition for the national identity. The writer says that films like Numafung is a national film and all films should be kept in the same category to make the marginalized community in the mainstream and there we can get the real flavor of the real Nepali film.
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