Dhafer L’Abidine and Yasmine Al Massri in a still from ‘Palestine 36’ courtesy of Philistine Films
Why, you ask? Because if we are ever to understand the Palestinian/Israeli issues of the present, we need to go back nearly a century and wrap our heads around the crimes, struggles and mistakes of the past.
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A still from ‘Cotton Queen’, courtesy of Strange Bird
Behind what could be a simple tale of a young girl coming of age in Sudan, filmmaker Suzannah Mirghani’s debut feature weaves an extraordinary and cautionary tale of respect for one’s self and for the environment around us, which are always crucially, and importantly intertwined.
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The discovery of Farah Nabulsi’s stunning, honest and beautiful film ‘The Present’ I owe to Palestinian favorite actor Saleh Bakri. I mean, as soon as I saw his name on the Brooklyn Film Festival line-up page, I was hooked. But while his presence is undeniably a wonderful pull into the film, Nabulsi’s perfect oeuvre stands on its own.
The title ‘The Present’ could refer to a gift, the one Yusuf, Bakri’s character goes to buy for his wife on their wedding anniversary. But it also means, to me, the current state of affairs, the here and now, for the Palestinian people.
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