Straight to the heart

Mohamed Khan

The 4th Arab Film Festival (17-26 July) was no ordinary Arab event: it took place, after all, in the Institut du Monde Arabe, Paris -- the capital of a nation whose relations with the Arab world continue to raise heated arguments, particularly in this year of the bi-centenary of the French Expedition to Egypt.

Though French-Arab relations have been far from cozy, film producers in Francophone Arab countries continue to seek to establish their credentials as filmmakers in the French capital. What the setting of this film festival highlights is the difference between films made by directors who look to Paris for recognition (Lebanon and North Africa) and by those who are more grounded in their Arab cultural identity (Egypt).

Sponsored mainly by the French ministries of culture and foreign affairs, the festival was blessed with a host of luminaries. Costa Gavras was the honorary director of the festival, while the jury, headed by Algerian director Ahmed Rachedi, comprised Lebanese actress Nedal Al-Ashqar, Morrocan novelist Mohamed Barrada, Alexandria-born French singer Georges Moustaki and directors Jacques Bidou (France), Farid Bughedir (Tunisia) and Mohamed Khan (Egypt).

The audience was, not surprisingly, the kind of audience one would expect in L'Institut du Monde Arabe. This was mostly composed of budding French Arabists and students of Oriental languages, diplomats and officials from international organisations and third generation Arab immigrants to France who thanks to festivals like this manage to retain an ersatz connection to the homeland. For recent immigrants, however, the festival is a non-event: they find the Institut du Monde Arabe an intimidating social setting. The only film where they had a strong presence in the audience was at the screening in an out-doors cinema of Anwar Al-Qawadri's Gamal Abdel-Nasser.

In competition were two Egyptian entries, Adel Adib's Hysteria and Sherif Arafa's Idhak El-Soura Titla' Helwa (Say Cheese). The two Syrian entries were Anwar Al-Qawadri's Gamal Abdel-Nasser and Raymond Boutros' Al-Tarhil (Deportation); the Lebanese entry was Ziad Dowairi's Gharb Bairut (West Beirut); the two Algerian films were Abdel-Karim Bahloul's Laylat Al-Masir (The Sacred Night) and Mirzak Alwash's Bayrut-Al-Gazair Zahab Awda (Beirut-Algiers Aller Retour); Palestine brought Ali Nasser's La Voie Lactee (The Milky Way) (produced with Israeli funding); Morocco's entries were Nabil Aywash's Maktoub (Fated), Abdel-Qader Lagtaa's Ahali Al-Dar Al-Bayada (The Casablancans) and Daoud Aould Sayed's Wadaan Ayuha Al-Gharib (Goodbye Stranger) and Hassan Bin Galloun's Asdiqaa Al-Ams (Friends of Yesterday) while Tunisia brought Keswa Al-Khayt Al-Da'i (Keswa, The Lost Thread) and Ghadan Sa'ahtariq (Tomorrow I shall burn).

With the exception of the two Egyptian films and the Palestinian (Israeli-produced) film, all the features were either fully produced by France or co-productions. In addition to long features, there were 16 short feature films, nine documentaries and eight short documentaries. In these categories too, it was noticeable that most of the Lebanese and North African films were sponsored some way or another by the French film industry.

In their representation of the Arab world, most of the films adopted a Westernised perspective and forged an image of a war-torn region in a state of collapse that needs the West as its saviour.

The Lebanese-French production Gharb Bairut (West Beirut) directed by Ziad Dowairi won the Grand Prize for Best Feature Film. Set in civil war-torn Lebanon of the '70s, this technically accomplished film explores the complexities of religious sectarianism -- which permeates even the brothels -- through the eyes of three children, two Muslim boys and their friend, a Christian girl.

Best Documentary was awarded to Syrian director Omar Amiralai's Mazalat Ashya' Kathira Yumkin Hikayatiha (There Are Still Many Things that Can Be Told). A series of interviews with playwright Saadallah Wannous on his deathbed, this powerfully weaves together Wannous' losing battle against cancer and the depressing reality of the fifty-year Arab struggle against Zionism, of dreams that never came true, of disillusionment. Indeed, Wannous himself recalls that he began to sense that he had cancer after the Gulf War. The link between the personal (Wannous' illness) and the political is visually achieved through the montage that collates Wannous' intermittent words from his deathbed and the image of water falling drop by drop.

The two Jury Awards went to feature film La Voie Lactée and Fatima Jebli Ouazzani's documentary Fi Manzil Abi (In My Father's House). La Voie Lactée, set in a Palestinian village, sensitively dramatises the range of attitudes -- from the collusion of the village chief's son to the courageous resistance of the school teacher -- towards the Israeli occupation. The autobiographical Fi Manzil Abi (In My Father's House) tells the story of a Moroccan woman who escapes patriarchy (taboos on pre-marital sex, arranged marriages) to Holland. Folkloric in its treatment of Arab women's issues, this film pandered to already established western notions.

With the viewers, the Egyptian films -- particularly Hysteria and Say Cheese -- had the lion's share of emotional response. None of the Egyptian films in the festival won an award -- a cause for gripe with viewers from Egypt. Indeed a fracas ensued when Egyptian director Mohamed Khan announced that Egyptian cinema was in the doldrums, which occasioned an outburst from actor Ahmed Zaki. The fact is that Egyptian films, replete as they are with song and dance routines and highlighted by many a joke, present a formula for which the jury might have little sympathy but which goes straight to the heart of Arab audiences.