Programmation Mediapart : Moyen-Orient

Sharqiya's power comes from several inversions. Kamel is a Bedouin. He lives with his sister-in-law and his brother in an unauthorised village set up in the desert of southern Israel. It's barely a village, just several sheet-metal shacks furnished with knick knack, found objects, and salvaged material. These huts are invaluable things that the authorities are about to level, however, and that the inhabitants will have to build again, as though nothing had occurred, waiting for the next destruction. This is the first inversion that aims to show exile, expropriation, and the blind labour of diggers, not in Palestine but in Israel. Then comes the second inversion, the man is required to keep watch over the others. Kamel is a guard. He, whose life is utter misery, is in charge of the bus station security. The third inversion is the most striking. Kamel has an idea. He doesn't voice it, but the audience follows precisely its course with his gestures and his looks. His idea is to plant a bomb in a station. To give himself like the one who found it, to act as a hero in front of the camera. To take advantage of the held-out microphones in order to arouse national interest on his fate. And therefore to prevent his dwelling from being levelled. The plan is good. It has got to work. It turns out that it won’t work all the way though. Kamel will have his fifteen minutes of fame, but that will not impact the decision of the authorities. So, everything remains to be done, to be done again. How better to suggest the disarray of Israel than by superimposing on the same face the three figures of the expropriated, the terrorist and the policeman? How better to denounce absurdity and impotence? Here, Ami Livne deals with Israel only. And yet, he’s arguably dealing with Palestine too. Sharqiya is a calm and composed film, which makes it all the more appalling, like a western of today’s despair.

This movie tells of Afghans that the director has met in Paris. They relate part of their long journey and their everyday life as exiles.

1974. Lebanon is a fertile ground for intellectual, cultural and political life. From March to April, for 37 days, a few students of the Beirut American University are picketing the premises of the University to protest against the fee increase. 2011: during the Arabic revolution, Rania and Rafei decide to look back and to address the current situation in the light of  this hope-filled period. That will lead to the civil war.

It all goes down to a crucial question, to revive the past, to evoke it, or to recreate it? Here, the method is decisive. First, one has to do some thorough research, then, start the experiment, as it is about observing the current impact of past events as much as analysing them. Therefore, the protagonists from the past, are today played by their potential counterparts, political actors involved in current struggles. What is democracy today, how to fight?
Equipped with signs and iconic accessories (a picture of Che, a megaphone), they are launched into an experiment supported by improvisation, where a form of theatricality enhanced by in camera dialogue converses with cinema. And, in the dialectics of the past and of the present, memories, just as much as present words, flow around, just like the interviews of the film, which make past and present words inextricably linked.