Cinema of Palestine

West Asian cinema

Cinema of Armenia Cinema of Azerbaijan Cinema of Bahrain Cinema of Cyprus Cinema of Georgia Cinema of Iran Iranian New Wave Cinema of Iraq Cinema of Israel Cinema of Jordan Cinema of Kuwait Cinema of Lebanon Cinema of Palestine Cinema of Saudi Arabia Cinema of Syria Cinema of Turkey Cinema of the U.A.E. Cinema of Yemen

Villagers of Halhul waiting for an open-air film show, around 1940

Part of a series on
Palestinians
Demographics
Definitions · Palestine · History Name · People · Diaspora Territories · Refugee camps West Bank (geography) Gaza Strip (geography) Electoral districts Governorates Arab localities in Israel Arab citizens of Israel Cities · East Jerusalem Depopulated villages
Politics
Fatah Hamas · PLO PNC · PLC · PFLP Palestinian National Authority (PNA) Political parties in the PNA Palestinian flag · Law
Religion / Religious sites
Islam · Christianity · Judaism Dome of the Rock Al-Aqsa Mosque Great Mosque of Gaza Cave of the Patriarchs Church of the Holy Sepulchre Church of the Annunciation Church of the Nativity Joseph's Tomb · Rachel's Tomb Lot's Tomb · Nabi Samwil
Culture
Art · Costume and embroidery Cinema · Cuisine · Dance Handicrafts · Language Literature · Music
Notable Palestinians
Mahmoud Abbas · Naji al-Ali Hanan Ashrawi Hany Abu-Assad Tawfiq Canaan Mahmoud Darwish · Emile Habibi Atallah Hanna Faisal Husseini Haj Amin al-Husseini Abd al-Qader al-Husseini Ghassan Kanafani Ghada Karmi · Leila Khaled Walid Khalidi Ibrahim Abu-Lughod Edward Said · Khalil al-Sakakini Ahmad Shukeiri · Elia Suleiman Fadwa Touqan · Ibrahim Touqan Khalil al-Wazir · Ahmed Yassin May Ziade · Wael Zwaiter
v · d · e

Palestinian cinema is relatively young in comparison to Arab cinema as a whole, many Palestinian movies are made with European and Israeli funding and support.^[1] Palestinian movies are not exclusively produced in Arabic and some are made in English, French and Hebrew.^[2] It is believed that there have been over 800 films produced about Palestinians, the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, and other related topics.^[3]

History

The first period: The beginning, 1935-48

The first Palestinian film to be made is generally believed to be a documentary on King Ibn Saud of Saudi Arabia´s visit in 1935 to Palestine, made by Ibrahim Hassan Sirhan, based in Jaffa^[4](also spelled Ibrahim Hasan Serhan.^[5]) Sirhan followed the King and around Palestine, "from Lod to Jaffa and from Jaffa to Tel Aviv". The result was a silent movie that was presented at the Nabi Rubin festivals. Following this documentary, Sirhan joined Jamal al-Asphar to produce a 45-minute film called The Realized Dreams, aiming to "promote the orphans´cause". Sirhan and al-Asphar also produced a documentary about Ahmad Hilmi Pasha, a member of the Higher Arab Commission.^[6][7] In 1945 Sirhan established the "Arab Film Company" production studio together with Ahmad Hilmi al-Kilani. The company launched the feature film Holiday Eve, which was followed by preparations for the next film A Storm at Home. The films themselves were lost in 1948, when Sirhan had to flee Jaffa after the town was bombarded.^[8]

The second period: The epoch of silence, 1948-67

The Naqba of 1948 had a devastating effect on the Palestinian society, including its nascent film industry. Cinematic endeavours, requiring infrastructure, professional crews, and finance, nearly ceased for two decades.^[9] Individual Palestinian participated in the film-production of neighbouring countries. It is reported that Sirhan was involved with the production of the first Jordanian feature film, The Struggle in Jarash, (1957), and another Palestinian, Abdallah Ka´wash, directed the second Jordanian feature film, My Homeland, My Love, in 1964.^[10]

The third period: Cinema in exile, 1968-82

After 1967 Palestinian cinema was founded under the auspices of the PLO, funded by Fatah and other Palestinian organisations like PFLP and DFLP. More than 60 films were made in this period, mostly documentaries. The first film festival dedicated to Palestinian films was held in Baghdad in 1973, and Baghdad also hosted the next two Palestinian film festivals, in 1976 and 1980.^[11] Mustafa Abu Ali was one of the early Palestinian film directors, and he helped found the Palestinian Cinema Association in Beirut in 1973. Only one dramatic movie was made during the period, namely The return to Haifa in 1982, an adaptation of a short novel by Ghassan Kanafani. ^[12]

The film archives disappearance, 1982

The different organisations set up archives for Palestinian films. The largest such archive was run by PLO's Film Foundation/Palestinian Film Unit. In 1982, when the PLO was forced out of Beirut, the archive was in storage (in the Red Crescenty Hospital), from where it "disappeared" under circumstances which are still unclear.^[13]

The fourth period: The return home, from 1980 to the present

The 1996 drama/comedy Chronicle of a Disappearance received international critical acclaim,^[14] and it became the first Palestinian movie to receive national release in the United States.^[15] A break-out film for its genre, it won a "New Director's Prize" at the Seattle International Film Festival and a "Luigi De Laurentiis Award" at the Venice Film Festival.^[16] Notable film directors in this period are especially^[17]:

• Michel Khleifi
• Rashid Masharawi
• Ali Nassar
• Elia Suleiman

An international effort was launched in 2008 to reopen Cinema Jenin, a cinema located in the Jenin Refugee Camp.

In 2008, three Palestinian feature films and an estimated eight shorts were completed, more than ever before.^[18]

In 2010, Hamas, the governing authority in the Gaza Strip, announced the completion of a new film. Titled The Great Liberation, the film depicts the destruction of Israel by Palestinians.^[19]

Currently in the Gaza Strip, all film projects must be approved by Hamas' Culture Ministry before they can be screened in public. Independent filmmakers have claimed that the Culture Ministry cracks down on content not conforming to Hamas edicts. In a notable 2010 case, Hamas banned the short film Something Sweet, directed by Khalil al-Muzzayen, which was submitted at the Cannes Film Festival. Hamas banned it from being shown locally due to a four-second scene where a woman is shown with her hair uncovered. In 2011, a film festival hosted by the Gaza Women's Affairs Center which included documentaries and fictional pieces on women's issues, but the Culture Ministry censored numerous scenes. One film had to remove a scene where a woman lowered one shoulder of her dress, and another had to remove a scene of a man swearing.^[20]

Notable directors

• Hany Abu-Assad
• Scandar Copti
• Mustafa Abu Ali
• Mohammed Bakri
• Tarek Al Eryan
• Annemarie Jacir
• Michel Khleifi
• Rashid Masharawi
• Mai Masri
• Montaser Marai
• Rosalind Nashashibi
• Ali Nassar
• Mohamad Al-Sawalma

Notable films

The Alhamra Cinema, Jaffa, 1937, bombed December 1947,^[21]

Main article: List of Palestinian films

• They Don't Exist[1]
• Wedding in Galilee (1987) (International Critics Prize, Cannes),
• Chronicle of a Disappearance (1996) (“Luigi De Laurentiis” Award for a Debut Film at the 1996 Venice Film Festival)
• Divine Intervention (2002).
• Olive Harvest, The (2003)
• Arna's Children (2003)
• Women in Struggle (2004)
• Paradise Now. (2006) (Golden Globe for Best Foreign Language Film winner)
• The Color of Olives (2006)
• Iron Wall (2006)
• Goal Dreams (2006)
• First Picture (2006)
• Maria's Grotto (2007) (Silver Muhr Award, Dubai International Film Festival)
• Salt of this Sea (2008)
• Taste the Revolution (2008)
• The View (2008) (Best Short Film ($75,000) , Middle East International Film Festival)
• Till When? (2008) (Officially selected in Cergy Pontoise Film Festival in Paris,Honorable Mention in Digicon 6 Festival in Tokyo)
• cup final (1991) takes place during the Israeli invasion of Lebanon.

Notable film festivals

• Boston Palestine Film Festival
• Chicago Palestine Film Festival
• Ann Arbor Palestine Film Festival
• DC Palestinian Film and Arts Festival
• London Palestine Film Festival
• Al-Kasaba International Film Festival[2], in Ramallah, West Bank

See also

• Cinema City Nablus
• Al-Kasaba Theatre
• Cinema Jenin

References

1. ^ 'We have no film industry because we have no country' April 12, 2006, The Guardian
2. ^ Palestine Film Foundation
3. ^ Palestinian Revolution Cinema Comes to NYC, by Emily Jacir 16 February 2007, The Electronic Intifada
4. ^ Gertz and Khleifi, p. 13
5. ^ Dabashi (2006), p. 9
6. ^ Gertz and Khleifi, p. 13
7. ^ Khaled Elayya: A Brief History of Palestinian Cinema, This week in Palestine
8. ^ Gertz and Khleifi, p. 13-14
9. ^ Gertz and Khleifi, p. 19
10. ^ Gertz and Khleifi, p. 20
11. ^ Joseph Massad: The weapon of Culture: Cinema in the Palestinian liberation struggle. Ch . 2 in Dabashi (2006), p. 33, 36
12. ^ Gertz and Khleifi, p. 20-30
13. ^ Gertz and Khleifi, p. 28-30
14. ^ Chronicle of a Disappearance. All Movie Guide. Accessed June 7, 2009.
15. ^ Chronicle of a Disappearance. ArtForum. Summer, 1997.
16. ^ Awards for Chronicle of a Disappearance. Imdb.com Accessed June 7, 2009.
17. ^ Gertz and Khleifi, p. 30-34
18. ^ Palestinian filmmakers beat the odds to hit silver screen April 22, 2009, CNN
19. ^ http://www.jpost.com/Home/Article.aspx?id=187996
20. ^ http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-4102960,00.html
21. ^ List of Irgun attacks

Further reading

• Rapfogel, Jared: A Report of Dreams of a Nation - A Palestinian Film Festival, January 24-27, 2003, Senses of Cinema.
• Palestinian film festival planned, 18 May, 2004, BBC
• Dabashi, Hamid: For a Fistful of Dust: A Passage to Palestine, 23 - 29 September 2004, Al-Ahram
• Film Jan. 14, 2006, IMEU,
• Kemp, Rebecca: “Interviews with Palestinian Filmmakers”, 6 Degrees Film, Fall 2006
• Rastegar, Kamran, "Palestine Only Exists in Cinema", Bidoun Magazine, Issue 8, Vol. 1, Fall 2006
• Provan, Alexander (February 2007). "Requesting Permission to Narrate: Dreams of a Nation: On Palestinian Cinema". Stop Smiling Magazine. http://stopsmilingonline.com/features_detail.html?id1=754. Retrieved 2007-04-09. ^{[dead link]}
• Annemarie Jacir: Coming Home: Palestinian Cinema, 27 February 2007, The Electronic Intifada
• Khaled Elayya: A Brief History of Palestinian Cinema, This week in Palestine
• Khadija Habshneh: Palestinian Revolution Cinema, This week in Palestine
• Nana Asfour: Reclaiming Palestine, One Film at a Time, Cineaste Magazine, Vol. XXXIV, No. 3, Summer 2009

External links

• Dreams of a Nation, an independent project founded to provide resources and information on Palestinian cinema. Based at Columbia University, USA.
• Palestinian Film: News and Reviews at IMEU.net
• Review of a film that explores the story of the lost archives of the PLO film unit
• History and Trends in Palestinian Filmmaking

Literature

• Dabashi, Hamid, and Said, Edward (preface) (2006): Dreams Of A Nation: On Palestinian Cinema, Verso Books, London, United Kingdom, ISBN 1844670880
• Gertz, Nurith; Khleifi, George (2008): Palestinian Cinema: Landscape, Trauma, and Memory, Indiana University Press. ISBN 0253220076