Film review: The Ants and the Grasshopper

I wrote about The Ants and the Grasshopperlast year as a film to look out for. It’s out today, a heartfelt exploration of the power of stories to make change. As the tagline puts it, “how do you change someone’s mind about the most important thing in the world?”

The film begins in the village of Bwabwa in Malawi, where we meet Anita Chitaya. She’s a farmer and a mother, a neighbour and an activist. We follow her in the fields as she explains her organic growing techniques. We also see her at work in the community, organising workshops and events that break down stereotypes of ‘women’s work’ and get men more involved in running the household – as her own husband Christopher has learned (eventually) to do.

We also see how the village is affected by changing weather patterns, the walk to fetch water, the difficulty of growing…