|
|
Posted by finkployd in
Info
Tuesday, April 12. 2005
I met Mahmoud Kaabour [director of Being Osama] in Montreal. An ambitious Lebanese [like every Lebanese], who hopes to move the world with his documentaries...
...and has succeeded thus far.
I watched Being Osama and found it worthy of its acclaim, but felt that the characters seemed somewhat surreal, quite a bit off from the norm, which to an ignorant audience, can mislead towards misconceptions of "What is an Arab in North America".
Here's a full review by The Daily Star:
Being Osama
Lebanese director explores the difficulties of carrying the Al-Qaeda leader's name and being an Arab in Canada in award-winning documentary
by Ramsay Short
Wednesday, March 23, 2005
"How much more does an Arab need to do to become a Canadian," Mahmoud Kaabour says via email from Montreal. The 25-year-old Lebanese who has lived, studied and worked in Canada since 1998 has just returned from the Canadian Race Relations Foundation's Anti-Racism Awards in Alberta. There he received a Certificate of Merit for his documentary film "Being Osama," which aired in February on the prestigious Canadian Broadcasting Corporation's series "The Passionate Eye."
Kaabour was refused permission earlier this month by Canadian Immigration services to visit Harvard University in the United States, where "Being Osama" was one of six documentary films screened at a festival entitled "New Documentaries From The War On Terror."
Fittingly, racism and the difficulties facing Arabs in Canada are exactly what the young director's film is all about.
"It's ironic," he explains, "and so frustrating. Having lived in Canada for such a long time and perfected my English and French and contributed to multi-culturalism with my film, it's absurd that I keep waiting for the day when I'll be considered a permanent resident of Canada."
Kaabour, a Concordia University graduate, was not allowed to travel because he remains an Arab in the eyes of Canadian authorities and not a citizen despite the fact that he has lived in Montreal since he was 19. He has not yet been granted security clearance for his application for permanent residence though he has everything else - medical clearance and assurances from Ottawa that he will be allowed to remain on humanitarian grounds.
"This was the big story that no one picked up on last year when my documentary was first aired. I came here at 19 to study film and Canada grew on me," he explains. "So I submitted an application for immigration in 2001 but it still hasn't received a final ok. If I leave the country my file will be annulled, so I haven't been able to visit my folks or Raouche or Gemmayzeh or any of my favorite places in Beirut for five years now."
Kaabour explained that the Canadian Immigration services will let him go wherever he wants but there is no guarantee he will be allowed to return.
Being an Arab in North America is not easy today. Three-and-a-half years after the September 11, 2001, attacks on the U.S. and two years since the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq, if you have not been interned at the pleasure of the American government as an Arab or Muslim, you are likely to have faced obstacles in everything from applying for a driver's license to depositing a check in your name in a bank.
Canada, the more tolerant and generally better-regarded nation for Arabs and Arab immigrants, has also been guilty of impeding Arabs (both Muslims and Christians) in their daily lives.
In Montreal where Kaabour's film is set, there are about 68,000 Arabs, two-thirds of whom are Muslim, according to a 2001 federal census.
Produced by independent Canadian production company Diversus Films, and funded by the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC) (Kaabour received $309,000 from CBC to make the film, about 50 percent more than the average cost of a CBC documentary) "Being Osama" examines exactly the above subject.
Except that the Arabs involved did not face a backlash because of their skin color, race or religion. They faced adversity because of their name.
"The film was a way for me to evoke memories of my childhood, the weddings, the funerals," says Kaabour who is a Muslim. "I had shit happen to me because of my name after September 11, working for racist Italians - but I didn't want to make a film about myself. I preferred to make it about a whole community through the Osama hook."
"Being Osama" explores the lives of six Montreal residents with highly diverse backgrounds, interests, and personalities, united by their first name and by their experience as Arabs living in Canada in the post-September 11 world.
It is an intelligent, well-made story that raises questions in the viewer without banging them over the head with the dilemmas faced by the Osamas involved. Not only does it touch on the subject of racism in Canada, "Being Osama" does much to combat that racism by portraying the humanity of the subjects and meaning of identity through their Arab names, rock and roll, religion, Middle East politics, and indeed weddings and funerals.
The film follows the subjects beginning with the launching of the American invasion of Iraq in March 2003 to the anti-WTO demonstrations in late July of that year, and offers an intimate look at the evolving lives of each of them.
There is Osama Sarraf, a Palestinian-Canadian who is a successful DJ and aspiring rock star, pursuing a chance at his big break. There is Osama Naggar, an Egyptian-Canadian who is an opera expert and major importer of classical CDs, as he celebrates his birthday and finally makes peace with his identity as a Quebecois.
Then there is the diminutive Osama al-Jundi, a Lebanese-Canadian who runs a Muslim school and holds onto his roots and traditions as he cares for his students and lives through the sudden loss of his father. One of the more outspoken of the six is Osama Demerdash, a politically active Egyptian-Canadian who battles injustice in the streets and in the courts even as he wrestles with his own future in Canada.
Osama Dorias is an Iraqi-Canadian political science student who embraces Canadian life and dreams of being a diplomat while pondering the proper way to be a "cool Muslim." And finally there is Osama Shalabi, a composer and musician from an Egyptian family who provides music and a narrative commentary throughout the journey.
None of them look like your typical post-September 11 Osama bin Laden-standardized image of an Arab - Osama Sarraf has dreadlocks and goes to church, for example.
"It was important to show the fact that none of the Osamas match the usual stereotype of the person with a beard sitting on a camel with a gun," Kaabour says.
All the Osamas have dealt with personal attacks or problems because of their names.
Shalabi had his bank account frozen after attempting to deposit a cheque in his name. Demerdash's colleagues in a computer firm tried to get him fired. Sarraf saw his career as a musician suffer with rejections from record companies. And Naggar says poignantly at one point "My name was stolen from me."
"Being Osama" has gotten a lot of recognition, attracting around 500,000 viewers when it was aired last month in Canada. It won Best Documentary at the University Film and Video Conference in the United States in 2004 and consequently was selected for the screening at Harvard. No small achievement for Kaabour, who was unable to speak about his film at the University's festival.
Quoted in The Montreal Gazette, one of the assistant curators at Harvard's film archive responsible for selecting "Being Osama" for screening, said of the film: "I'm fascinated as an American to find that some of the challenges we face are washing over into Canada," adding that the American public broadcaster PBS sadly would not show such films as it was under political and financial pressure and couldn't afford to be controversial.
Kaabour, however, is unbowed and hopes to get his film to Lebanon and the Arab world this year.
"I hope we can get it to the likes of the Docudays film fest in Beirut, and the Dubai Film Festival might be interested. I am also trying to get it to the Ismailia Documentary Film Festival and am negotiating with Al-Jazeera to get it aired too."
For those interested in watching the film now, "Being Osama" can be purchased through the U.S. based distribution company www.arabfilm.com
Kaabour's next project is a film about his grandfather - one of the legendary Egyptian diva Oum Kalthoum's violinists: "He left behind him seven beautiful violin improvisations recorded on a little tape-recorder which I had remastered here in Canada."
As for Kaabour's status as a permanent Canadian citizen he may leave whether he can return to Montreal or not. "I will be returning to the Middle East this year whether the immigration file is concluded or not since enough damage has occurred, in my opinion.
"I miss Beirut a lot," he said. don't we all
-dailystar
Being Osama can be purchased online at:
www.arabfilm.com
-finkployd
Posted by finkployd in
Info
Saturday, April 9. 2005
...the Memory for the Future movement brought some gravitas to the civil war commemorations Friday by announcing its program for the upcoming six days.
At a news conference held at the Phoenicia Inter-Continental hotel, four of the movement's members revealed the launch of a national contest to design a monument for the war, a competition for a short-film on peace, the undertaking of a census on the number of civil war casualties and the resumption of the "Understanding the War" campaign.
The four components of the program fall under the umbrella of the movement's overall objective to foster dialogue around the war in a bid to promote national reconciliation. Founded in 2000 by Amal Makarem, the organization today gathers some 40 journalists, lawyers, historians and others.
"To understand the war helps us to understand the present," Makarem said simply.
The war monument contest is open to all landscape architects - both professionals and students, announced committee member Karim Mroue.
"It's a monument we are planning to build in Solidere for the victims of the war," the real estate developer explained.
"At present time its exact location is still under negotiation, but it will probably be either at Martyrs' Square or at another square dedicated solely to the monument."
The selection process is scheduled to close by April13th 2006 - the newly declared "National Unity Day," on which the war broke out.
Tied in to the monument for the war is the census being launched by the movement to create a comprehensive database on the victims of the 15-year-conflict. The name of every casualty will eventually be engraved on the war monument to be erected.
"We are calling on all Lebanese to send in the names of people they knew who died during the war, with details as to where, when and how," Makarem said.
"We are also looking for information on those who disappeared. All of this will be collected into a database, with accurate figures and facts on what happened during the war years.
If it's national reconciliation they're after, then maybe the "how" should be limited to the direct cause of death [bomb, bullet, etc...]. Accurate figures and facts are great, but extrapolating them into "what happened" is not only dangerous, but downright stupid when attempting to maintain a delicate balance. Any such information could result in the rekindling of hate and animosity, especially as the heads of the militias that fought the war [read: the militias that slaughtered 50,000 a piece {at least}] are still leading this country... where? no idea.
The official figures we currently use are low estimates, provided by the Lebanese security forces. We need to update these, and clarify them."
The second competition launched was presented by media consultant Jad al-Akhawi, son of the legendary Lebanese radio broadcaster Sharif al-Akhawi, whose name has been given to the prize of the contest.
"He was famous during the early years of the war, notably because he warned people which roads were safe to take, so as avoid checkpoints where kidnappings were taking place. He was a guiding light for many Lebanese," Mroue said of the Radio Lebanon anchor.
The prize will be granted to the best short film on civil peace by a Lebanese producer.
The movement also announced the continuation of its "Understanding the War" campaign, launched in 2003 through local media. The campaign urged youth to send in any questions they had pertaining to the war. The response was overwhelming.
"We received thousands of questions, from all over the world," Makarem recalled. "It's a valuable process, because it helps to provide clarification on the issue, which is essentially what our work is about.
And based on all the questions we receive, we will organize a follow-up conference to the one held after the previous launch, to discuss them."
In the eyes of the committee members, the time is ripe for a discussion on the war, most notably due to the current political upheaval facing the country since former Premier Rafik Hariri's assassination.
"Recent events have made the Lebanese even more involved in the national project of putting an end to war and hostilities," said lawyer Ziyad Baroud.
"And it precisely because the society in its entirety is so involved at present, that we must seize the momentum and make people think about what has happened.
"After all, it's been 15 years since the war ended - it's high time for us to reflect upon the past, which is an exercise that has not been undertaken yet, and that is one of the reasons why the Lebanese feel insecure. I sense a real change now in 2005. There is a readiness for reconciliation among the Lebanese," Baroud said. -dailystar
As Ziad Rahbani so beautifully put it, we all want the truth, but the truth is not based on opinions. There are too many opinions as to what happened during the civil war, and very little in terms of fact to establish right from wrong opinion. If we are to manifest dialogue, we must focus on the picture at large, not the details. Only when we accept that we are all responsible, and all victims, will we be able to understand the underlying concepts. But, first and foremost, we must vote the militia heads out of the government, out of any position of power, and claim our country as our own, a country for the Lebanese people, with only one agenda... the prosperity of the Lebanese as Lebanese. is that possible?
-finkployd
Posted by finkployd in
Info
Saturday, April 9. 2005
Jewelry constitutes 40 percent of Lebanon's total exports. -dailystar
Posted by finkployd in
Info
Monday, April 4. 2005
the World Economic Forum has outlined the key concerns that are limiting Lebanon's progress:
According to the Forum's Arab World Competitiveness Report, Lebanon's progress has been largely limited by government corruption and red tape, spiraling public debt, poor use of technology and limited participation in the global economy. As a result, Lebanon was ranked among the lowest two countries in the region in terms of its economic competitiveness.
-finkployd
Posted by finkployd in
Info
Monday, April 4. 2005
The US forces, like the Crusaders before them, are prisoners in their own fortresses: Sitting in Saddam Hussein's palace they can stare over the parapets but that is as much as most will ever see of Iraq
By Robert Fisk 02 April 2005
I drove Pat and Alice Carey up the coast of Lebanon this week to look at some castles. Pat is a builder from County Wicklow, brave enough to take a holiday with his wife in Beirut when all others are thinking of running away. But I wanted to know what he thought of 12th-century construction work.
How did he rate a Crusader keep? The most beautiful of Lebanon's castles is the smallest, a dinky-toy palisade on an outcrop of rock near the village of Batroun. You have to climb a set of well-polished steps - no hand-rails, for this is Lebanon - up the sheer side of Mseilha castle and then clamber over doorsills into the dark, damp interior.
So we padded around the battlements for half an hour. "Strongly made or they wouldn't be still here," Pat remarked. "But you wouldn't find any company ready to put up the insurance. And in winter, it must have been very, very cold."
And after some minutes, he looked at me with some intensity. "It's like being in a prison," he said.
And he was right. The only view of the outside world was through the archers' loopholes in the walls. Inside was darkness. The bright world outside was cut off by the castle defences. I could just see the splashing river to the south of the castle and, on the distant horizon, a mountainside. That was all the defenders - Crusaders or Mamlukes - would have seen. It was the only contact they had with the land they were occupying.
Up at Tripoli is Lebanon's biggest keep, the massive Castle of St Gilles that still towers ominously over the port city with its delicate minarets and mass of concrete hovels. Two shell holes - remnants of Lebanon's 1975-1990 civil war - have been smashed into the walls, but the interior of the castle is a world of its own; a world, that is, of stables and eating halls and dungeons. It was empty - the tourists have almost all fled Lebanon - and we felt the oppressive isolation of this terrible place.
Pat knew his Crusader castles. "When you besieged them, the only way to get inside was by pushing timber under the foundations and setting fire to the wood. When they turned to ash, the walls came tumbling down. The defenders didn't throw boiling oil from the ramparts. They threw sand on to the attackers. The sand would get inside their armour and start to burn them until they were in too much pain to fight. But it's the same thing here in Tripoli as in the little castle. You can hardly see the city through the arrow slits. It's another - bigger - prison."
And so I sat on the cold stone floor and stared through a loophole and, sure enough, I could see only a single minaret and a few square metres of roadway. I was in darkness. Just as the Crusaders who built this fortress must have been in darkness.
Indeed, Raymond de Saint-Gilles spent years besieging the city, looking down in anger from his great fortress, built on the "Pilgrim's Mountain", at the stout burghers of Tripoli who were constantly re-supplied by boat from Egypt. Raymond himself died in the castle, facing the city he dreamed of capturing but could not live to enter.
And of course, far to the east, in the ancient land of Mesopotamia, there stand today equally stout if less aesthetic barricades around another great occupying army. The castles of the Americans are made of pre-stressed concrete and steel but they serve the same purpose and doom those who built them to live in prisons.
From the "Green Zone" in the centre of Baghdad, the US authorities and their Iraqi satellites can see little of the city and country they claim to govern. Sleeping around the gloomy republican palace of Saddam Hussein, they can stare over the parapets or peek through the machine-gun embrasures on the perimeter wall - but that is as much as most will ever see of Iraq.
The Tigris river is almost as invisible as that stream sloshing past the castle of Mseilha. The British embassy inside the "Green Zone" flies its diplomats into Baghdad airport, airlifts them by helicopter into the fortress - and there they sit until recalled to London.
Indeed, the Crusaders in Lebanon - men with thunderous names like Tancred and Bohemond and Baldwin - used a system of control remarkably similar to the US Marines and the 82nd Airborne. They positioned their castles at a day's ride - or a day's sailing down the coast in the case of Lebanon - from each other, venturing forth only to travel between their keeps.
And then out of the east, from Syria and also from the Caliphate of Baghdad and from Persia came the "hashashin", the "Assassins" - the Crusaders brought the word back to Europe - who turned the Shia faith into an extremist doctrine, regarding assassination of their enemies as a religious duty.
Anyone who doubts the relevance of these "foreign fighters" to present-day Iraq should read the history of ancient Tripoli by that redoubtable Lebanese-Armenian historian Nina Jidejian, which covers the period of the Assassins and was published at the height of the Lebanese civil war.
"It was believed that the terrorists partook of hashish to induce ecstatic visions of paradise before setting out to perform their sacred duty and to face martyrdom..." she writes. "The arrival of the Crusaders had added to ... latent discontent and created a favourable terrain for their activities." Ouch.
One of the Assassins' first victims was the Count of Montferrat, leader of the Third Crusade who had besieged Acre in 1191 - "Saint Jean d'Acre" to the Christians - and who met his death at the hands of men sent by the Persian "terrorist" leader, Hassan-i Sabbah. The Assassins treated Saladin's Muslim army with equal scorn - they made two attempts to murder him - and within 100 years had set up their own castles around Tripoli. They established a "mother fortress" from which - and here I quote a 13th-century Arab geographer - "the Assassins chosen are sent out thence to all countries and lands to slay kings and great men".
And so it is not so hard, in the dank hallways of the Castle of St Gilles to see the folly of America's occupation of Iraq. Cut off from the people they rule, squeezed into their fortresses, under constant attack from "foreign fighters", the Crusaders' dreams were destroyed.
Sitting behind that loophole in the castle at Tripoli, I could even see new meaning in Osama bin Laden's constant reference to the Americans as "the Crusader armies". The Crusades, too, were founded on a neo-conservative theology. The knights were going to protect the Christians of the Holy Land; they were going to "liberate" Jerusalem - "Mission Accomplished" - and ended up taking the spoils of the Levant, creating petty kingdoms which they claimed to control, living fearfully behind their stone defences. Their Arab opponents of the time did indeed possess a weapon of mass destruction for the Crusaders. It was called Islam.
"You can see why the Crusaders couldn't last here," Pat said as we walked out of the huge gateway of the Castle of Saint Gilles. "I wonder if they even knew who they were fighting."
I just resisted asking him if he'd come along on my next trip to Baghdad, so I could hear part two of the builder's wisdom. - Robert Fisk
Posted by finkployd in
Info
Friday, April 1. 2005
"Btifrok 3ala Sania" (A Second Changes Everything)
"MashHad min al-Masrah" (A Scene from the Stage)
Director: Sharif Abdel-Nour
Actors: Johnny al-Haje, Yasmina Hatem, Raouf Farhat Khalifeh, Achraf Mtaweh and Cynthia Salameh.
nightly @ Monot Theater till April 10
for Info: +961 1 202422
synopsis:
"Btifrok" is a 50-minute-long side-splitting comedy that takes place in a cafe in Beirut and revolves around an intellectual, snobbish female and a young street-smart gentleman who tries to seduce her ... a procedure that is frequently interrupted by the lovable and annoying waiter. -dailystar
"Machhad" is a mime largely based on audience participation.
The play has one performer - Abdel-Nour himself - who builds the stage from scratch by removing objects from his coat and silently uses body language to introduce the play topic. He then selects volunteers from the audience to act out the different parts. Five audience members, completely untrained, get on-stage for the first time and act the whole play, in mime of course. -dailystar
reviews:
"They are bringing back hope to this country," one critic said, "at a time when everyone thought Lebanese theater was dead or forgotten." -dailystar
"There is something very fascinating about this show," says veteran Lebanese actor Joseph Bou Nassar on his way out of Monnot Theater on Tuesday. "When I first arrived [in the theater], I was tormented by the country's critical situation and now I can't seem to remember the very first thing about it. My heart is light and I can't stop smiling," he said. -dailystar
|
|
|
Blogging Beirut Comments