Buffalo Niagara Film Festival - Buffalo and Niagara Falls, NY, USA

Grissi Siknis

The Miskito are a large tribal group of linguistically similar people inhabiting eastern central america between Rio Tinto in Honduras and Pearl Lagoon in Nicaragua. They are descended from a mix of European, Creole, Chinese, African and native American peoples making them racially diverse. The majority of the modern miskito live in small villages, farming, raising animals or fishing to supply their livelihood. The miskito religion is a conglomerate of traditional Indian mysticism and European Christianity, and combine Biblical and mystical spitituality. Symptons of grissi siknis vary, but a distinct set of central characteristics, most of the victims are young girls from 15 to 18 years old. The attacks are prefaced by headaches, dizziness, anxiety, nausea, irrational anger and/or fear. During the attack the victim loses consciousness and falls to the ground, subsequiently running away. The victim may view other people as devils, feel no pain for bodily injuries and have absolute amnesia regarding the physical circumstances. Some grab machetes or broken bottles to wave off unseen assailants.
Miskito tradition holds that grissi siknis is caused by possession by evil spirits, they believe to be caused by a dilman or evil sorcerer.
According to western medicine this is a trance-like disturbances occur with unusual frequencies in certain societies.


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Exact Runtime
01 hr : 34 min : 00 sec

Date of Completion
September 2008

Country of Production
Mexico, Nicaragua, Spain

Country of Filming
Nicaragua