Beirut - Despite the political turmoil that has paralyzed Lebanon's economy,
Lebanese filmmaker Nadine Labaki has paved her way to the Director's
Fortnight section of the upcoming 60th Cannes Film festival.

Another section, Tous Les Cinemas Du Monde, will showcase a day- long, mini
festival of Lebanese films to illustrate the country's cinematic strength
and the role of history in domestic film production.

Directors Nadine Labaki and Danielle Arbid earned the privilege for their
films Caramel (Sukar Banat) and Un homme perdu (A lost man).

nadine labaki cannes film festivalLabaki (pictured right), a well-known
actress and music video director, finished her feature film Caramel, a
comedy, just nine days before Israel launched its 33-day war against Lebanon
on July 12, 2006.

'In a sense, I wanted the Israeli people to see the film and understand what
kind of people we are,' Labbaki was quoted as saying.

'Caramel' tells the story of five Lebanese women from different generations
and religious backgrounds who meet in a Beirut beauty salon. They use the
'Caramel' in the title to wax their legs.

The feature film concentrates on the five women. Layal, played by Nadine
Labaki, works in the beauty salon in Beirut along with three other women.
Each one has a problem: Layal has an affair with a married man, Nisrine, a
Christian is set to wed a Muslim, Rima is lesbian and Jamal frets about
growing old.

The film was produced by French producer Anne-Dominique Toussaint's Les
Films des Tournelles with a budget of 1.2 million euros (1.6 million
dollars).

The Arab TV network ART, Lebanese distribution company, Sabbah Media, were
also contributors and are responsible for distributing the film across the
Middle East.

'I think Labbaki will encourage other Lebanese filmmakers to produce more
Lebanese films, and enhance the film industry after a long setback following
the Civil War in 1975,' said Sadek Sabbah, the manager of Sabbah Media.

'We want to make sure Caramel is well distributed because we think all Arabs
who love Lebanon and know Lebanese society well, will enjoy watching it,'
Sabbah said and described Labbaki as 'a talented-perfectionist director.'

He expressed hope that people like Labbaki would help revive Lebanon's film
industry and bring it to the forefront once again.

In the Middle East, a blend of lemon juice, water, and sugar is boiled to
make a caramel mixture that is then cooled on marble. In beauty salons, it
is used to remove unwanted hair. This was the titular inspiration for
Lebanese director Nadine Labaki's Caramel, a bittersweet story of five women
of varying ages who meet or work in a Beirut beauty salon and help each
other overcome the problems they encounter in their lives with regard to
love, marriage, and sex.

Labaki describes the filmmaking process:

"The film came from personal questioning I have about Lebanese women [who]
are an example of emancipation, of liberty, of independence for other
regions in the Middle East. Lebanese women are really doing what they want
in their lives. But at the same time, there is this struggle with their
traditions, their religion, their education. It is still a little bit rigid.
So it is a struggle between these two worlds. I am someone who is working in
films. I am doing whatever I want. I am an example also of freedom and
emancipation. At the same time, I always have a huge feeling of guilt. I
don't want to disappoint anyone. I want to be an example of this woman that
is perfect for her family, perfect for her husband, perfect for her
children. This is how the film started. I wanted to take examples of
different women, different ages, different religions, different situations
so I can try to sum up the struggle of the Lebanese woman. I [worked with]
male cowriters because I wanted to have a male view on the script. I didn't
want a film against men because this is not my aim.

"The women that I chose for the film are very courageous women. They want to
make a difference, they want to change things, and this is why they are in
this film. Of course, it is very delicate. All the women in the film are
women who want to enlighten. They are willing to take the chance. Because
[Lebanon] is a country where family ties are really important. You live with
your family until you are married. If a woman is 50, she has to live with
her family because she is not married. There is so much pressure.

"Acting in the film was a huge risk for me. Of course, I had a will to do
it. I love acting. I love to be in the skin of someone else, to get out of
the routine of my own personality. But I was very hesitant because I didn't
want to harm the film. But then I realized when I was with the other actors
in the scene, because they are not professionals, they felt more comfortable
with me being with them in the scene. So, I started getting the best out of
them when I was with them. There is also a lot of improvisation in the film,
so I could take it into the directions I wanted. So I took the decision to
act, and I don't regret it at all. It was even easier for me to direct from
'the inside' than from 'the outside.'

"When you think about Beirut, normally you see a grey picture, you see
smoke, you see buildings that are destroyed, you see women crying in the
street. This is what comes to your mind when you see the word Beirut. And I
wanted to change that. I wanted to make a film that was colorful and about
warm people, because this is also our reality. I think I come from a
generation that doesn't want to look back, that doesn't want to talk about
war anymore. It wasn't easy in my case, because I finished the shoot and a
week later the war broke out again. So I had a huge feeling of guilt. Why
was I making a film about life when my country was at war? But then I
thought maybe this was my way of struggling, of resisting: making films
about life [in a time of war].

"I think it helped me being a woman director. I was very lucky to find a
producer. I found a producer even before I started to write. I met with my
producer, Anne-Dominique Toussaint, in Lebanon and I was telling her about
my dream of making a film and what I wanted to talk about, and she was
interested. And two years later, we are in Cannes. I have never had a
struggle because I was a women director."