Author Salman Rushdie, or at least his on-screen likeness, is returning to Western New York four years after a traumatic stabbing in Chatauqua, New York.
“KNIFE: The Attempted Murder of Salman Rushdie” is among the films showing at this year’s Buffalo International Film Festival, which opens Thursday. BTPM News reporter Alex Simone sat down with Rachel Eliza Griffiths, who is the film’s cinematographer and Rushdie’s wife.
Alex Simone: One of the things that really stuck out to me was in the aftermath of the stabbing when you were recording Salman and you asked if it was all right to record him, and he said no hesitation, said everything is okay for you. What did that do in terms of confidence, especially after a traumatic incident,
Rachel Eliza Griffiths: What happened is that maybe a day or two before I began to actively make video footage, he had asked me if I would document by taking an image or something along the way. We didn't really know what was going to happen, and he was like, "It would be important for us to document this. We weren't thinking like, "Hey, this is going to be a documentary that is directed by Alex Gibney. It was just, "We're going to document this for ourselves because we don't know what will happen next.
AS: Being a filmmaker and, you know, a visual artist, was it at all difficult still to I guess like balance being so close to the subject matter and also trying to have that artistic eye at the same time?
EG: Whatever I'm looking at, that artistic presence is going to be there. But there were many days where it was just too terrifying and upsetting and traumatizing to say, ‘it's time to bring the camera out.’ There were many days where the camera was never taken out, and I would say to him, you know,’ should we have a conversation? Should I turn the camera on?’ The camera for me was a place where I could put feelings and emotions I couldn't share directly or explicitly with Salman about my anger, my own shock, my own grief.
AS: Can you take me inside the creative room? I don't know if storyboarding is the right word here, but especially you being the producer, but also being a visual artist yourself. Like, how much discussion was there as far as you being a part of that creative process, right?
EG: Once Salman and I were able to return home, and Salman was able to look at some of the clips of the footage I'd taken, he said, you know, maybe there's something bigger here than us. And so, as Salman was working on Knife, Alex was really working on the film with the footage. So there is a kind of synergy between the memoir Knife and Alex's process. And then later on, I wrote a memoir called The Flower Bears. And so they're kind of a trilogy where you have Knife, you have the Flower Bears, and then you have a film.
AS: Having this featured, really, right up the road from where the stabbing occurred, how significant is that for the both of you?
EG: Salman got to a certain point in his writing process where he just, he was really adamant that he needed to go back to Chautauqua. And I was not there the day of the attack, I'd never been to Chautauqua. And you know, it was kind of, it was this weird kind of dissonance where Chautauqua Institution, the lake, it's so beautiful. And I just could not stop thinking about that community and the effect of trauma and shock to imagine yourself being a member of the audience that day. The people who ran toward the stage rather than running away from the stage are pretty much the reason Salman is alive. You know, many of their names I'll never know, their faces, but there was something in them that's so brave and courageous for them to do that. (They) will always have my gratitude and his, too. I won't I will never have closure from this. I will have different steps of evolution and dealing with a complex, post-traumatic stress disorder, which I have to navigate almost every day. You know, writing, making the film is a way to resist violence. Is a way to resist being silenced.
AS: “KNIFE: The Attempted Murder of Salman Rushdie” will air at 6:45 p.m. on Oct. 13 at North Park Theatre.
