Feature Documentary
TOTAL BUDGET
US $291,511
CONFIRMED FINANCING
€ 28,310
CONTACT
info@beall.fr
jean-marie@beall.fr
+33143487611
30 years ago, Hiam left her native Palestinian village in Galilee to follow her acting dream in France. Her daughter, Lina, questions the mother’s bold choices and the way the women in her family—whom she had left behind—had influenced her life.
30 years ago, Hiam left the Palestinian village of Deir Hanna in Galilee, where she grew up with her grandmother, Um Ali, her mother, Neemat, and her seven sisters, in order to pursue her acting dream in France.
With her camera in hand, Hiam’s daughter, Lina, questions her mother’s bold choices and the way the women in her family—whom she had left behind—had influenced her life. To be able to reach the source of transmission, Lina unveils the multiple layers of her mother’s journey, starting from who Hiam is today; an internationally renowned actress.
The personal journey of each woman figure in the film takes us back to a time slot in history. Um Ali’s character takes us to the native territory, Tiberias; the lost territory. Neemat takes us to the adopted territory, Deir Hanna; the imposed territory. Hiam, who chose to leave in order to thrive, leads us to the desired territory—Paris; a chosen exile.
Echoes from Um Ali’s and Neemat’s journeys resonate with that of Hiam’s. Despite their dispersed Palestinian identity in different territories, they have taken control over their destinies, and influenced the world around them. The film pieces together images of today along with family archives, historical footage, and extracts of fiction films. It explores the transmission of memory, space, know-how, femininity, and resistance. It is a voyage through the different lives of Palestinian women for whom dispossession has become the norm, and resilience a daily background music.
By taking me to Palestine each summer, my mother wanted me to bathe in a pool of family stories and collective memory. She involved me in her family life back home, as well as in her life as an actress, as if she wanted to give me the tools to navigate between distanced worlds, like she does in cinema.
I have seen my mother change skin through films, embodying different facets of the Arab woman, from the most traditional to the most rebellious. Out of all the women she played, I wonder which one is the closest to me. I look for the common points between these fictional women, my mother, the women of my family, and me.
As I decide to go back to the source, I realize how much my mother’s elders represent an anchor in her life. As a fourth-generation, and the first to be born outside of Palestine, I am part of the trail of women’s transmission. I carry in me the stories of the women in my family. I question their legacies, and knit the bonds between them in order to answer the question that is tormenting me: How can a woman embrace the world?
The narrative will unfold in the form of a collage. The film combines images filmed today, family archives, historical archives, and extracts from fiction films. Sometimes static and other times in motion, the camera travels inside the territory, from story to story, woman to woman, and generation to generation.
Producing this film is an addition of encounters, stories, and commitments. This project proposes to open a personal and intimate door to history, bringing together several generations of Palestinian women.
The Palestinian question is generally shown through the prism of the West Bank, Gaza and East Jerusalem. This film is an invitation to change our gaze. It opens up new perspectives on the questions of exile, identity, and memory.
We have been developing the film since 2018. After a successful crowdfunding campaign and a donation from La Fondation de France, we have obtained a development financing aid from the Procirep-Angoa. We were then able to fund a first scouting in Galilee. We have also launched the digitization and preservation of numerous personal archive films and family photos.
The project was pitched in Ramallah Docs in October 2019, and Lina Soualem worked on the treatment with her co-writer Nadine Naous. In addition, a teaser and an assembly of sequences were edited by Gladys Joujou. With these elements, the project received writing support from the CNC, and a selection at Meditalents 2020. We are now seeking financing to continue developing the film and to be able to prepare a future shooting. Today, we are in advanced discussions with Arte.
Thanks to the strength of the subject and the narrative and cinematographic ambitions of Lina Soualem, we are able to imagine exploring both a cinema distribution and a television broadcast.
2019: Boléro
2019: Cinéma by Yvan Attal
2019: The Twinkling Eye