A determined female trucker is part of an endless-seeming metal snake winding through the Gobi Desert of Mongolia as she embarks on the hazardous journey toward the Chinese border. Such is life in “Minegolia,” as it has been dubbed. Now, a documentary by Khoroldorj Choijoovanchig takes us into the desert drive experience. Meet Colors of White Rock, world premiering at the Tribeca Festival on Sunday, June 7, in the documentary competition.
“Ever since its shift toward liberalism after the Cold War, Mongolia has opened up its mines in the Gobi desert for exploitation — resulting in an onslaught of truck convoys transporting Mongolian coal to China,” highlights a summary of the film. “Within this arduous, predominantly-male line of work, Maikhuu — a former taxi driver and hairdresser — stands alone as one of the only female truck drivers working the mining boom.” The tenacious and candid woman is also a single mother focused on her young children’s financial future.
Colors of White Rock is a cinematic trip into a world that will be new to many in the audience. The doc was executive produced by Chantal Perrin and produced by Tessa Louise Salomé and Luc Sorrel. Choijoovanchig, who also handled the cinematography, co-wrote the doc with Perrin, Salomé and Kate Kennelly. The editor is Simon Le Berre. International sales are handled by MetFilm Sales.
The Tribeca website promises “a deeply immersive work that presents the striking human and environmental costs of ‘Minegolia.’”
Choijoovanchig and Perrin talked to The Hollywood Reporter about the hard work going into the doc, the arduous work of the desert truck drivers and why it tells a universal story.
Just like the long, tedious journeys of the truckers through the desert, the doc didn’t have an easy ride. “It started with this nine-minute short,” recalls Choijoovanchig. “I was doing some promotional videos for mining companies, and I saw this enormous line [of trucks] with my own eyes. I was flying a drone, and that image was really inspiring – this big iron snake crawling in the desert.”
When he talked to the people, he also felt that “the drivers were really passionate about their jobs, but it was sad because they were so tired, like zombies, really working hard. So, I thought I wanted to make a film about this.”
Perrin asked him to put together the short video, really liked it and was in awe of Maikhuu, the female protagonist. “She is amazing, she is street-wise and so sweet,” Perrin tells THR. “I love her, she’s so brave and wicked and clever.”
Colors of White Rock still took seven years to complete, with the COVID-19 pandemic among the challenges that the team had to overcome. And there were hundreds of hours of footage. “Making a story out of 600 hours of footage was a challenge,” shares Perrin. “We ended up with the 45th version of the edit.”
The doc allows Maikhuu to become visible to a world that may largely not be aware of the social plight of the Mongolian truck drivers and the harsh working conditions and lack of health care they are used to.
Choijoovanchig didn’t necessarily think of her story as either a local or a universal one. “Every human story is universal, I believe, so, as a filmmaker, I approach the story not as local, foreign or global. I always approach stories as human stories.”
But Perrin and other international collaborators helped him highlight key takeaways for audiences outside of Mongolia. “Because coal is the main export commodity of Mongolia, it brings healthy export income to the country,” Choijoovanchig explains. “But it also comes at a cost.”
Perrin was interested in the aspects of human and environmental exploitation. “I am always concerned with ecology and the environment, and I know that this is happening everywhere – we’re digging, and we are destroying and causing damage,” she tells THR. “So, of course, one of the reasons that I got involved was this political and human rights aspect of the story.”
Among other things, Colors of White Rock touches on how a lot of Mongolians move from the countryside to the city, destroying the traditional nomadic lifestyle. “Because of natural disasters, we get droughts, and the herders and nomads in the countryside suffer, and they lose their animals,” Choijoovanchig tells THR. “And that’s why more people from the countryside go into the mining jobs, and some of them drive these trucks.”
The filmmaker summarizes his hope for the doc this way. “Hopefully, it will raise awareness [among] the decision makers, so that these people’s situation can improve a bit. I hope this film makes up people’s minds to help improve their working conditions. As a fellow Mongolian, I know [that] we live in a country that has been trying to develop for the last 30 years, since we became a capitalist country and free-market economy in the 1990s, but we are still sandwiched between two giant [authoritarian] neighbors, Russia and China. We are trying to be a democratic country, a free nation, but economically, as a mineral-rich country, we are really tied to them. This is a kind of metaphor behind this film.”
Original Article on Hollywood Reporter