About this Short Film
Possibility not Disability (Riti Ramanujachari, Australia, 2020) This short film sits comfortably within the Focus on Ability festival, offering a thoughtful look at how we see ability and difference. Rather than telling a single story, it explores themes around blindness, congenital disability, dwarfism and other physical and sensory differences. The film highlights young people, group dynamics, and shared interests such as music and sport, inviting viewers to rethink assumptions about capability and viewpoint. Quiet and observant, it celebrates talents and everyday lives without sensationalising them. A gentle, human portrait that asks us to notice what ability looks like from many perspectives.
Film Details
Country:
Australia
State:
New South Wales
Category:
Open Entrant Documentaries
Genre:
Personal Story
Festival Year:
2020
Filmmaker:
Riti Ramanujachari
Film Transcript
I find goalball a really great opportunity because of the inclusivity it involves. Through wearing a blindfold everybody is placed on the same level. We have people who play goalball who are fully sighted, including my brother and some of my friends. Overall it's an awesome opportunity to see the capabilities of people who have low vision in sport, because if it comes to things like soccer or tennis our capacities are a lot lower because we can't see the ball or sometimes even the other players. So having goalball is a great opportunity to have some fun and to be competitive in sport and to get fit.
As a visually impaired person I like singing, I like playing piano and keyboard — just music in general: playing music, creating music, listening to music. These hobbies make me feel so happy and relaxed and I usually resort to these hobbies when I'm stressed or in the middle of something that's just really heavy, so I can just use these to chill, relax and calm down.
My name is Amy Ridley and I'm 17 years old.
Hi guys, my name is Nathan Rahman. I am 17 years old and I have the most common form of dwarfism.
Having a disability and the word itself basically lends itself to a lack of ability, and in my opinion the biggest thing that makes us lack ability is not actually the physical or cognitive condition we have but the perceptions and perspectives of the society around us.
What kind of things do people do that sometimes annoy me or that I don't really like? "How many fingers am I holding up?" Question. One of the fun facts about this question is literally everybody who ever does it is holding up two fingers, so even if you are blind you can probably say "two" and be right. Sometimes some adults look really awkward because to us it feels like you're questioning whether we're telling the truth or not and you're testing us, but really we've had a lot of vision tests in our lives and we know how much we can see. So I don't think that in any way asking someone that question is actually looking to gain any understanding from them; it's more of a habit, and a critique for us.
How are people with dwarfism and with visual impairment depicted in the media? I think we as people with dwarfism are represented in a very wide range of ways. I think that this just comes down to the normalisation that is in media and in literature about what's normal and the things that we depict. Sinéad Burke — she is an Irish public speaker — and she has just come into the media recently, maybe like last year or the year before, for her TED Talk about people with disabilities. She is an extremely inspirational woman. She is such a strong advocate for equality not just with people with dwarfism but with anyone and everyone with disabilities in general, and there's been a push to change this in recent years. When we looked at gender and its presence in movies and TV shows, or different races and religions, when it comes to disabilities there aren't many advocates who are pushing for equal representation, or not necessarily equal representation but a better representation of the presence of disability in our society.
Filmmaker
Riti Ramanujachari is the filmmaker behind this entry. See every Focus on Ability entry from Riti Ramanujachari.
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5 comments
Very touching
Very sincere and honest representation.
Factual commonsense observations to take on board .
Truly inspirational.
Crisp and touching