In a world built on traditions passed through generations of oral storytelling, the influence of modern technologies, such as electricity and later-on technology, has greatly impacted the shift in how we as humans now gather information.

Director Saber Zammouri has created a piece that both reflects the impact new forms of community have on small communities – with this film focused on rural villages in Tunisia – and the change it has made for the relationships built between those within these circles. It speaks to the dying skill of shared stories passed down through families. How  our communities are forming and how that reflects this change, with individuals focusing on facing forwards towards a television set instead of towards one another.

The Wasp and the Orchid also speaks to the power this new world holds, showing individuals such as the director moving away from their homelands and exploring places with new opportunities. Zammouri speaks to the understanding that “was (this move) a choice, or an obligation?” when it comes to his interaction with this new world available to him, bringing into questions the agency we hold as individuals and the choices we make as a daily basis.

In a way, the irony of this film is exactly that: this is a film on how media has changed the world as we know it. It speaks to the lengths we have gone as a society to further access to the world around us without realizing that this innately disrupts how we learn to connect with the people within our own communities. I think the most important lesson in this film is the power we must take hold within the choices we make, and whether they are the cause and effect of higher powers, they are ours and they matter.