Bridging Cultures, Meeting Minds

The recent seventh Dubai International Film Festival returned to full strength this year. And the discussions showed how essential cultural platforms of this type are in the region. Hanna Labonté reports from Dubai

Dubai Press Conference (photo: obs/Government of Dubai, Department of Tourism and commerce)
"Vibrant young film scene": The Dubai International Film Festival has been held annually since 2004, now a hub of cinema culture for the entire Middle East, Africa and Asia and a platform for renowned Arab filmmakers

​​ If there's one thing that expatriates and Emiratis agree on, it's that Dubai is gradually emerging from the paralysis into which the small desert emirate had fallen during the financial crisis. Whether it can ever return to its former bizarre futuristic beauty remains to be seen, but the signs of recovery are impossible to ignore.

One plain indication is that the 7th Dubai International Film Festival, the absolute highlight of the city's cultural calendar, returned to full strength this year.

Plenty of stars flew in to add to a phenomenal film programme. But the most impressive aspect was the stark rise in visitor figures, showing a growing interest in films outside of the everyday consumer templates.

Vibrant Emirati film scene

The festival, which showed over 150 films from 75 countries from 12 to 19 December, attracted mainly expatriates, in line with Dubai's population structure. However, the audiences looked completely different when it comes to Emirati movies, mainly short films. Whether the international guests stayed away or the locals are simply more interested in their own films, is open to question. Whatever the case, the auditoriums were full of buoyant Emiratis, celebrating and supporting the vibrant young UAE film scene.

photo: www.naylaalkhaja.com
Thou shalt not judge:</i> Emirati director and producer Nayla Al Khaja

​​ Emirate films tend to focus on aesthetic and technical style, photographic and acting skills. The political messages otherwise very present in Arab film are sometimes missing or only subtly hinted at. This may, however, be down to the nature of the short form, which is also popular in Gulf literature.

The Emirati director and producer Nayla Al Khaja's short film Melal went down very well with the local audience. Portraying a young Emirati woman's boredom on her honeymoon, her hopeless efforts to please her husband and her concerned view of the possibilities of a different life, it seemed to touch the hearts of the young viewers. The question of arranged marriages is a controversial one for local cinema fans; the film raises the issue but does not take a stance either pro or contra.

Political issues dominated

Political issues visibly dominated the presentations. The Palestinian director Abdallah Al Ghoul, whose 30-minute documentary Ticket from Azrael about Palestinian tunnels to Egypt was showcased, was unable to attend the festival as he is in prison in Egypt, accused of having entered the country through just such a tunnel.

image: www.dubaifilmfest.com
"A mixture of desperation and humanity": Scene from Abdallah Al Ghoul's Ticket from Azrael </i>

​​ The film, made on a single day, shows young men digging supply tunnels out of Gaza. Al Ghoul depicts the lack of prospects that prompts the men to take such a risk. A mixture of desperation and humanity runs throughout the film.

The political element was just as prevalent in the discussions after the films. After the screening of Omar Shargawi's My Father from Haifa, one viewer angrily rejected the critical comments on Palestine made by Shargawi's father in the film, prompting a dispute about "us and them": "We have a completely different opinion."

The result was a heated discussion about identity – who "we" are, and who that "we" includes and excludes. Shargawi summed up the uniting element of "us" in his response: "Of course, ‘we' never have the same opinion." Diversity of opinion, however, he commented, is key to recognising and inventing that "us" through dialogue.

And this was perhaps the greatest benefit of this year's film festival as a whole: it offered a platform for discussion, more than living up to its motto. And it provided an opportunity to celebrate and encourage the region's ambitious young film scene.

Hanna Labonté

© Qantara.de 2010

Translated from the German by Katy Derbyshire

Editor: Lewis Gropp/Qantara.de

Qantara.de

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