New Delhi: With a Palistinian movie Paradise Now making its way to the Oscar nominations for the first time ever, the time for Palistinians to be represented as an independent culture has finally arrived.
The film covers 48 hours in the lives of two young Palistinian men who are trained to be suicide bombers. In the movie, Said and Khaled are fitted with explosive vests and set out for their mission.
But things do not go according to plan. In the frantic attempt to set things right, Khaled and Said begin to question and explore their motivation for what they are doing.
With the film being put up against four other films in the best foreign language film category, the director of the movie Hani Abu-Assad has every reason to be happy.
The other best forign language film Oscar nominations include the Italian Don't tell, French movie Joyeux Noel, German Sophie Scholl - The Final Days and the South African Tsotsi.
"This kind of recognition where I noticed from the people on the street, gives them the hope that they will be represented in the civilised world as an independent culture. This is the reason that people were happy on the street. I was surprised by this reaction but, if this is going to give people hope, then I am happy," says an ecstatic Abu-Assad.
Be it Steven Spielberg's Munich or George Clooney's Syriana, in the recent past, Hollywood has produced a number of movies that feature Arab characters and portray Arab issues.
"In general, I think Hollywood never represented Arabs in a good way.Their was in recent times efforts to change things. But still, I think they are Western directors looking at us from the outside world, but even if they have good intentions, still it is far from reality," rues Abu-Assad.
Abu-Assad says his next film will be based on the Arab perspective on the American dream of fame.
Comments
0 comment