Films of Palestinian Resistance continues with three short form documentaries.

THEY DO NOT EXIST
dir. Mustafa Abu Ali, 1974
Palestinian Territories. 25 min.
In Arabic with English Subtitles.

"There was no such thing as Palestinians." - Golda Meir
"There is no more Palestine. Finished." - Moshe Dayan

A young girl in a refugee camp writes a letter to her brother, a guerrilla fighter in training. Bombs are dropped, the wounded are cared for and the dead are buried. A mother mourns the death of her son. Survivors recount their experiences. The founding film of the PLO's revolutionary film unit, Mustafa Abu Ali's They Do Not Exist powerfully asserts the irrefutable facts of Palestinian existence.

screening with

THE DREAM
dir. Mohammad Malas, 1987
Syria, 45 min.
In Arabic with English subtitles.

Mohammad Malas is a Syrian filmmaker who, after teaching philosophy at Damascus University in the 1960s, turned towards filmmaking. One of his first projects was the experimental documentary, The Dream. Shot between 1980-1981 in Palestinian refugee camps in Lebanon, the film features children, women, old people, and militants recollecting their dreams and nightmares in a beautiful and haunting portrait of an uprooted population communicating their interior worlds. In 1982, hundreds of people in the camps of Sabra and Shatila were massacred by Lebanese forces with the support of the Israeli military. Because of this, Malas did not finish the project until 1987. The Dream is as much about Palestinian statelessness as it is about the fragmented nature of Arab nationalism.

“I think I managed to formulate a view that differs totally from other Arab and foreign contemplations. The difference is mainly that I adopted the position of a neighbor, thus an Arab, and not that of a Palestinian. This led to me focusing rather on our mutual relations than on the conflict with Israel. The viewer might realize how I emphasized those nightmares which the Arabs caused in the lives of the Palestinians. My concern is to show how the Arab world is addressing the Palestinian cause: first, one wanted to use the Palestinian issue and when this was not possible anymore, one tried to harm it… The fight between Israelis and Palestinians is as licit as public, yet the Arab-Palestinian conflict remains an internal affair, it happens in secret.”
-Mohammad Malas, speaking at the 11th International Documentary Film Festival Munich 1996

screening with
JENIN, JENIN
dir. Mohammed Bakri, 2002
Israel, Palestinian Territories. 54 min.
In Arabic with English subtitles.

The Battle of Jenin was a ten day long skirmish that took place in the West Bank-located refugee camp of Jenin in April, 2002 during the Second Intifada. Throughout the course of the battle, IDF bulldozers demolished large portions of the densely populated camp, with journalists and human rights advocacy groups alleging a civilian massacre. Official Israeli estimates initially reported approximately 50 Palestinian casualties, while Palestinian authorities and Amnesty International estimate the death toll to have been in excess of 500. Following the battle, the Israeli government denied a UN fact-finding team access to the camp. 

Made in response to the suppression of Palestinian media during and after the events, Mohammed Bakri’s harrowing and controversial documentary is composed only of Palestinian’s testimonies to their experiences. Upon its release, the film was temporarily banned in Israel on accusations of libel. Per Bakri’s lawyer, “Bakri doesn’t say anything in this film. The people who talk are those he filmed. So the residents of the refugee camp say things which sometimes are true and sometimes not. It’s a movie. It reflects the subjective understanding of the speakers.”

program trt: 124 min.

SUNDAY, NOVEMBER 19 - 2:30PM
$5 minimum donation.