Origin: Unknown | Documentary | Director: Fleifel, Mahdi | 5 minutes

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A world not ours

Mahdi Fleifel, documentary Lebanon 2012 5 min.

This documentary based on Ghassan Kanafani's novel is an accomplished study of a community dreaming of a lost homeland

A World Not Ours borrows its title from a novel by the author and activist Ghassan Kanafani: It is a filmed portrait of the Palestinian refugee camp in South Lebanon known as Ein El-Helweh, or "sweet spring". Mahdi Fleifel was born there, and moved away with his family to live in Dubai and Europe - but often returned with his video camera to visit friends and relations and build up this richly personal archive of impressions and interviews.

The result is a very watchable study of a stateless community, subsisting on dreams and memories of a lost homeland, and a generation of young men who have no prospects, sometimes drawn to jihadism out of sheer personal frustration. Yet they are often quite as critical of the Palestinian leadership as everything else. With his use of music and voiceover, cinephile Fleifel is clearly influenced by Woody Allen and Martin Scorsese and his style is humorous and compassionate, but my enjoyment of this film was qualified by some pointed political glibness.

On a trip to Israel, Fleifel sees some Holocaust memorials and simply superimposes video footage of Israeli soldiers assaulting Palestinians. That casual assertion of mere equivalence strikes a jarring note. It is a very accomplished piece of film-making nonetheless.

Trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_u6IrS2TLoU

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