LIAS Film Series: "This Is Not A Burial, It's A Resurrection"
Wednesday, December 3rd, 7 pm | SCALA Arthouse Cinema | free admission
03. Dec
This screening is part of the LIAS Film Series in cooperation with SCALA Programmkino. Each month, a curated selection of international films addressing cultural and social issues is presented, accompanied by introductions and discussions.
Date: Wednesday, 3 December 2025, 7 pm
Location: SCALA Arthouse Cinema | Apothekenstr. 17 | 21335 Lüneburg
Introduction with LIAS Fellow Grace Musila
This Is Not a Burial, It’s a Resurrection tells a cinematically dense parable about displacement and self-assertion. In carefully composed images, the director links the story of a single woman with the experience of an entire community that must assert itself against state planning and capitalist land grabbing.
The film, which premiered at the Venice Film Festival, has won numerous awards, including the Special Jury Award at the 2020 Sundance Film Festival. It was the first film from Lesotho to be nominated for an Oscar in the Best International Feature Film category in 2021.
In the remote mountain village of Nazareth in Lesotho, an old woman is preparing for her death until she learns that her hometown is to make way for a dam project. The grave she had planned for herself, as well as the graves of her ancestors, are to be flooded.
Instead of quietly accepting her fate, she rises up to defend the values and stories of her ancestors against the impending resettlement. Her decision to oppose the project sparks collective resistance and becomes the starting point for a reflection on land and belonging.
In powerful images, Mosese tells a poetic, political story about memory and self-determination. Between mythical and documentary imagery, This Is Not a Burial, It's a Resurrection negotiates central questions of the postcolonial present: Who owns the land? Who decides on progress? And how much resistance is there in memory?
With political urgency, the film depicts the struggle for the right to remain and offers a rare glimpse into a cinema that has received little attention to date.
This film is part of the LIAS film series in cooperation with the SCALA arthouse cinema. Every month, international films on cultural and socially critical topics are accompanied by introductions and discussions.
Free admission
2019 | Director: Lemohang Jeremiah Mosese | Lesotho | 120 Min | Original in Sesotho with English subtitles