Anytime there is stress going on in the world one of the first sections of the population which suffers is women. Women, being a rather vulnerable population, pay the price. Violence against them goes up. Control of women amps up. Rights go down. One such example is the access to abortion being taken away. Even in a country like the United States. Because abortion has been deemed illegal does not stop them from happening. Just means that women engage in riskier ways of terminating a pregnancy.
Marianne Farley’s (Marguerite, Rampage) short film, Frimas, allows us to follow the story of a woman living in a country in which abortion is illegal. She is married and pregnant. It is a pregnancy she wants to end. Without telling her husband (Jean-Moise Martin – Nelly, Threesome) what Kara (Karine Gonthier-Hyndman – from television’s Like Moi!) is going to do, this desperate woman has decided upon getting an abortion via an illegal mobile abortion clinic.
Just because she has found a place to get an abortion does not mean the hard part is over. She and those running the clinic have to keep hidden from the authorities. Then there is the fact that she is getting an abortion in a less than ideal environment. Finally, there is what Kara is going to have to do afterward. But she is desperate.
Tension is everywhere here. You don’t want Kara to get caught and you also are sickened by what she has to go through in order to exert control over her own body. The horrors of it all are everywhere. Kara has to undergo her illegal abortion in the back of a refrigerator truck amongst hanging meat.
Don’t ever sleep on the fact that as a woman we are not truly in control of our bodies. Social media, advertising and the fashion industry tell us how big our bodies should be. Governments made up largely of men rule upon whether women can decide what goes on with their bodies in regards to pregnancy. The rise of the extreme right across the globe has led to women being plunged into again dangerous environments in order to obtain an abortion. This 18 minute short is a wake-up call. Warning us that this can not only happen in Texas but the rise of the right and polarization of different sections of the population is happening here in Quebec as well. Heed the warning!