The Second Chicago Palestine
Film Festival 2003
By: Betsy Mayfield
Easter was particularly meaningful to me this year. Not because being in Chicago meant that I could bow my head in the exquisitely spiritual setting of the Fourth Presbyterian Church (where no mention of Palestine or the world’s conflicts was made), but because of the resurrection of action offered by the young people managing the Second Chicago Palestine Film Festival, 2003. Uptown, far from the filled pews of Easter worshipers and the glorious music of redemption at Fourth Presbyterian, the seemingly forgotten Preston Bradley Center served as a setting for a brave and richly informative film festival designed to show Americans what they do not know about the conflict in Bethlehem, Jerusalem, Ramallah, Gaza, Jenin. Sitting in the musty Women in the Director’s Chair black box, the meaning of Easter resonated for me in the commitment and the art of those who made the week long showings possible.
Expressing her group’s determination to make the Palestinian story available to all willing to watch, Danya Qato, director of the Chicago Palestinian Film Festival, explained, "As the liberation struggle continues in Palestine and as we grapple with the realities of war and injustice . . . our committee wants to offer. . .a plurality of visions on Palestine and the Palestinian people [which] can be freely shared." "This year," she continued, "we screened more than 40-films and videos from a diverse group of film makers each presenting their voice and perspective, raw and unfettered." Widad Albassam, Rena Barakat, Benjamin Doherty and Christopher Khoury joined Ms. Qato in creating a festival any film maker would have been proud to be part of and anyone who believes that peace will comes when we all seek truth and expect justice would have found awakening and reviving.
While I and those in the downtown pews with me received Easter’s solace, I wished that this mighty congregation could have experienced the uptown film sermons that, in a sense, belied the comfort of Easter purported to be ours. The uptown films showed very clearly that in the very place where hope of the Christian world began, only violence and lack of compassion were the songs being sung in the days before Easter’s joy, a joy missing in our most holy place.
The House of God, a gentle and tastefully presented film narrative about the Israeli seize of the Church of the Nativity in Bethlehem, written and directed by Yahya Barakat portrays the outcome of violence and hatred rendered not only on the people of the Holy Land, but on their churches and mosques, as well. This film should be in every church in America. What happened in Bethlehem reminds me that salvation still hangs on the cross and redemption is not at hand until hope and love extends beyond the individual "us" to people everywhere. To see the pain and suffering of the children of the West Bank and Gaza’s sad, desiccated towns as shown in I’m a Little Angel by Hanna Musleh or A Boy Called Mohammad, one of Five Palestinian Human Rights Stories by George Khleifi at the Institute of Modern Media at Al-Quds University, Jerusalem is to know the pain that the message of Easter has still not resolved for the people of the Holy land.
The Chicago festival drew crowds of well over a 100 to no fewer than 60. As we know from the popularity of movies and television, visual literature has the ability to lift Americans out of daily frustrations into recognition of the universality of human experience. In this case, films about the Palestinians not only turn thoughts away from ourselves, but show us why American indifference and silence leaves much of our world without the comfort we Americans get through our churches, particularly, on Easter. The films shown at Chicago, and recently, in Minneapolis, Des Moines, New York, San Francisco and increasingly throughout the US detail why it is wrong for America to support Israeli military incursions, settlement land grabs and winner-take-all-end games through billion dollar yearly aide packages and private support. All we Americans need to do is see the realities of Palestinian daily life from the safety of our own American theater seats. By simply being open to learning about why Israel has denounced justice and peace to expand a seemingly insatiable, Zionist dream, the establishment of a Jewish homeland, we can know and understand why "Barak’s generous offer" fails the Palestinians and all of us who seek redemption on Easter Sunday. Today, there is no freedom for Palestinians on their own land or even in their churches and mosques. Whether Palestinians remain where their ancestors lived, have fled to a refugee camp outside the area or begun a life in a new part of town, all the while replacing the pain of dispossession with a willingness to renew their lives and aspirations within the context of a changing landscape, they find no solace nor will they until we in America expand our concerns beyond ourselves to those who dwell in the land of God.
Thumbnail Film Reviews
The House of God, directed by Yahya Barakat, 42-minutes on CD. Contact Yahya Barakat at yahiabarakat@hotmail.com
The House of God, available for immediate use on a computer CD-drive, is an artistically and beautifully filmed piece about the Israeli siege of the Church of the Nativity in Bethlehem. Through testimony by various church fathers and re-enactment of crises from lack food, to handling of martyrs’ bodies, to hostages’ respect for the sanctity of the church, to Israeli intransigence and violence, Barakat and his cameraman, Mohammad Fawzi, shows us the realities of being Christian (or Muslim), Palestinian and not being alive and well while living in Bethlehem. A work worthy of being shown and archived in every church in America.
Video Petition Project, Artist Emergency Response, Art Institute of Chicago. 60-min. Video www.artistemergencyresponse.org or email: artistemergencyresponse@hotmail,com
For all those who try to tell the Palestinian story to a disbelieving audience or face negative reaction when asking for understanding or support for the Palestinian people, the Video Petition Project is a must-have item. The young people who put this together have made the most of the talking-head genre. Americans in Pittsburgh, San Francisco, Chicago and Toronto including individuals from all walks of life, ages, religions, including many of Jewish faith, boldly and sincerely lend support to ending the occupation and violence in Palestine. Anyone who has ever found that silence is the only game in town when the Palestinian perspective is proposed as a conversation topic needs this tape. Use one segment or all of it: This is mainstream America and Canada. Showing now at Chicago’s Museum of Contemporary Art.
I’m a Little Angel, Hanna Musleh, 40-minutes. Video. lilliamusleh@yahoo.com
Children of war begin life with all the expectations and baby-like giggles and joy of children anywhere, but, then, they experience harm. This film could be about children in Iraq, Bosnia, many places in Africa, but they are children in Palestine. This is a must see film for those who feel that terror is a one-way action perpetrated only by Arabs or Palestinians. The children in this film will never forget the pains of occupation, nor will we if we rise above indifference and dare to see.
Dairy of a Male Whore, Tawfiq Abu Wael. 14-min. Video. www.arabfilm.com
The title of this piece is unfortunate, because it conjures up illicit behavior that many in America do not want to think about. In fact, this short piece provides a glimpse into a reality of hunger, homelessness and loss. When people have no resources at all, no place, hardly any being, prostitution exists. We have movie classics about this. Think Midnight Cowboy. Neither male nor female prostitution is new. It happens in America; in the former Soviet states; in South East Asia and, here, as we see, in the war zone that Palestine has become. This film is the record of tragedy, so wretched that it terrorizes our most basic sensitivities. It is true horror.
Diogenes Ansar III, Hans Fel and Eitan Wetzler. 50-min. Video. Marmoo@vpro.nl
Ansar III was one of the largest detention camps established by the Israeli army after the 1987 Intifada. Closed for a time, this documentary re-visits the prisons heyday, talking with former Israeli guards who reveal their confusion over how European Jews had traversed in one generation from inmates in concentration camps in Poland to role reversals in the desert. Former Palestinian inmates report the crushing conditions and lack of due process of law they experienced. Ansar III has reopened as many Palestinians are again "indefinitely" detained. Having driven in the area of Ansar III, I remember how foreboding and cruel the prison looked, even from the road and Bedouin camps which lay sullenly in the shadow of this massive Soviet-style block structure. "Ansar III is not a concentration camp," I was told, as if the words "concentration camp" belonged only to Jewish sufferers and "detention camp" only to Palestinians. From the outside looking in, I could not tell the difference.
People and the Land, Tom Hayes. 57-min. Video. www.arabfilm.com
People and the Land examines the concrete realities of Israel’s conduct in the West Bank and Gaza, the level of U.S. support for that conduct through foreign aid, and the human cost of that aid in Palestine and the United States. This is a clearly presented and tough-love look at apartheid based on ethnicity in place where such action is often denied or excused as a security must. Great for historical perspective.
Waiting for Light, Rawan Damen, Video. info@palestinefilmfest.com
If the churches in America had shown this piece about Easter in Palestine, the strength and determination of Christians in the Palestine would have resonated good news to bolster the meaning of resurrection and hope. This is another short, but meaningful film for church school lessons and library archives. No violence, just cake baking. No hate, just concern for the neighbors. No bitterness, just the truth.
OTHER FILMS OF NOTE
Promises (2002)
United States, Israel, Occupied Territories, 1 hr. 56 mins., English
Directors: B.Z. Goldberg, Justine Shapiro, and Carlos Bolado
What is it really like to live in Jerusalem today? PROMISES offers touching
and surprisingly fresh insight into the Middle East conflict when film maker B.Z. Goldberg
returns to his hometown to see what seven children — Palestinian and Israeli —
think about war, peace and just growing up. Living within 20 minutes of each other, these
children are nevertheless locked in separate worlds. Through candid interviews, the film
explores a legacy of distrust and bitterness, but signs of hope emerge when some of the
children dare to cross the checkpoints to meet one another.
more information:
http://www.promisesproject.org/
http://www.pbs.org/pov/promises/
Tale of the Three Jewels (1994)
Palestine/Belgium/England, 107 min., Arabic w/Eng. subtitles
Director: Michel Khleifi
A
mixture of realism and allegory set against the backdrop of the violence in Gaza, TALE OF
THE THREE JEWELS is the story of Youssef, a 12- year old Palestinian boy who tries to win
the love of Aida, a beautiful Gypsy girl. Aida offers her heart on the condition that he
find her grandmother's lost jewels. Youssef is so smitten with Aida that he embarks on a
mystical pursuit that leads him to a wise old man, a mysterious scroll, death, and
resurrection.
Youssef's father is in prison and his brother a fugitive from the Israeli army. Yet,
despite the violence and fear all around him, Youssef lives submerged in his imagination,
often escaping the refugee camp to be with Aida in the sunny Gaza orange grove.
more information:
http://www.sfjff.org/sfjff16/p0722d.htm
http://www.hrw.org/iff-97/filmko/khletotj.html
Adrift in the Heartland (2001)
United States, 90 mins., English
Director/writer: Bridgid Maher
Adrift in the Heartland is an independent feature
film that begins when Jasmine Colbert, an ambitious young African-American social worker,
has an auto accident outside the apartment of Aysha Al-Halik, a newly-married Muslim
Palestinian woman. Though misunderstandings and stereotyping riddle their first meeting,
the two form a tenuous bond through their mutual love of jazz. The two women find strength
by virtue of their friendship to tackle their troubled relationships and actualize their
dreams.
more information:
http://www.tinyleaps.org/
Exodus (1960)
United States, Israel, 3 hr 32 mins, English
Director: Otto Preminger
The epic story of the Jewish refugees' battle to get to Israel.
Film score by Ernest Gold. Academy Award Nominations: 2, including Best (Color)
Cinematography. Academy Awards: Best Scoring of a Dramatic or Comedy Picture.
more information:
http://movies.yahoo.com/shop?d=hv&cf=info&id=1800062891&intl=us%0D%0D