Layla
02-18-2003, 03:26 PM
Just passing along the word for those interested in seeing a side of the story NOT endorsed by the national media outlets.
I'll probably go to "Divine Intervention", info on "Wedding in Ramallah" is FYI (I haven't had internet access for a few days...)
Peace,
Layla
There is a great opportunity to educate your friends and neighbors about the situation in Palestine and go out and enjoy an entertaining movie at the same time. The International Film Festival began yesterday and there are two films by Palestinians that will be screened.
Monday, February 17th at 7pm at Whitsell Auditorium (Portland Art Museum, SW Park and Madison in Portland), you can see A Wedding in Ramallah - Sherine Salama
In the Palestinian border town of Ramallah, the ritual enactment of cultural traditions exemplifies the struggle to preserve ordinary life amidst eruptive violence. With Middle East peace talks threatening to dissolve, émigré Bassan returns to his family from political exile in Cleveland. His painfully failed marriage to an American woman brings him home to seek a new bride. Opting for an arranged marriage in hopes of avoiding another broken heart, he reaches agreement with the family of 25-year-old Mariam, a woman whose world up to now has extended only as far as the perimeter of her small town. Salama's observational and interactive documentary follows Mariam to the home of her new in-laws where, after the pageantry of marriage, she awaits being able to join her husband who waits for her in an unknown Ohio. Exploring divides-political, sexual and generational-Wedding In Ramallah is an engrossing multi-act drama of visas, gunfire and crushed expectations that weighs the value of traditional institutions against the cost of personal freedom. (94 mins.) First Feature.
Saturday, February 22nd at 8:30pm at the Guild Theatre (S.W. 9th and Taylor), you can see
Divine Intervention- Elia Suleiman
Part parable, part experimental narrative, Suleiman utilizes irreverence, wit, mysticism and insight to craft an intense, hallucinogenic and extremely adept exploration of the dreams and nightmares of Palestinians and Israelis living in uncertain times. Subtitled, "A Chronicle of Love and Pain," Divine Intervention follows a Palestinian filmmaker living in Jerusalem (director Elia Suleiman) as he tends to his ailing father and girlfriend, a Palestinian woman living in Ramallah. Due to the unending conflict between Israel and Palestine, she isn't allowed into Israel and they meet at a deserted lot beside one of the notorious checkpoints. Their relationship and the absurd situations around them serve as metaphors for the lunacy of larger cultural problems, and the result is palpable, bottled personal and political rage. Yet the films acerbic, absurdist sense of humor (earning comparisons to Jacques Tati and Nanni Moretti), in a situation where death seems to lurk at every corner, and Suleiman's own directorial interventions, are what earned him the Grand Jury Prize at Cannes. In Hebrew and Arabic with English subtitles. (92 mins.)
Note: Divine Intervention was denied entry into the Ocar's race because the Academy determined that Palestine "is not a country." To read the story about the controversy, see http://www.latimes.com/cl-et-munoz14dec14.story.
I'll probably go to "Divine Intervention", info on "Wedding in Ramallah" is FYI (I haven't had internet access for a few days...)
Peace,
Layla
There is a great opportunity to educate your friends and neighbors about the situation in Palestine and go out and enjoy an entertaining movie at the same time. The International Film Festival began yesterday and there are two films by Palestinians that will be screened.
Monday, February 17th at 7pm at Whitsell Auditorium (Portland Art Museum, SW Park and Madison in Portland), you can see A Wedding in Ramallah - Sherine Salama
In the Palestinian border town of Ramallah, the ritual enactment of cultural traditions exemplifies the struggle to preserve ordinary life amidst eruptive violence. With Middle East peace talks threatening to dissolve, émigré Bassan returns to his family from political exile in Cleveland. His painfully failed marriage to an American woman brings him home to seek a new bride. Opting for an arranged marriage in hopes of avoiding another broken heart, he reaches agreement with the family of 25-year-old Mariam, a woman whose world up to now has extended only as far as the perimeter of her small town. Salama's observational and interactive documentary follows Mariam to the home of her new in-laws where, after the pageantry of marriage, she awaits being able to join her husband who waits for her in an unknown Ohio. Exploring divides-political, sexual and generational-Wedding In Ramallah is an engrossing multi-act drama of visas, gunfire and crushed expectations that weighs the value of traditional institutions against the cost of personal freedom. (94 mins.) First Feature.
Saturday, February 22nd at 8:30pm at the Guild Theatre (S.W. 9th and Taylor), you can see
Divine Intervention- Elia Suleiman
Part parable, part experimental narrative, Suleiman utilizes irreverence, wit, mysticism and insight to craft an intense, hallucinogenic and extremely adept exploration of the dreams and nightmares of Palestinians and Israelis living in uncertain times. Subtitled, "A Chronicle of Love and Pain," Divine Intervention follows a Palestinian filmmaker living in Jerusalem (director Elia Suleiman) as he tends to his ailing father and girlfriend, a Palestinian woman living in Ramallah. Due to the unending conflict between Israel and Palestine, she isn't allowed into Israel and they meet at a deserted lot beside one of the notorious checkpoints. Their relationship and the absurd situations around them serve as metaphors for the lunacy of larger cultural problems, and the result is palpable, bottled personal and political rage. Yet the films acerbic, absurdist sense of humor (earning comparisons to Jacques Tati and Nanni Moretti), in a situation where death seems to lurk at every corner, and Suleiman's own directorial interventions, are what earned him the Grand Jury Prize at Cannes. In Hebrew and Arabic with English subtitles. (92 mins.)
Note: Divine Intervention was denied entry into the Ocar's race because the Academy determined that Palestine "is not a country." To read the story about the controversy, see http://www.latimes.com/cl-et-munoz14dec14.story.