#people saying this movie tries to be apolitical are looking at it with eyes so fundamentally different from mine (including the director!!!)

[child-of-hurin]

.

alex garland's civil war is one of those movies where my experience watching it seems so different from everyone else's (even the writer-director's!), it's one of those alienating experiences... It sucks because I would love to talk more about it, because I think it's a very meaningful and intriguing work, but no review seems particularly insightful.

Another annoying point is that none of the things that, for better or for worse, truly bothered me about that movie seem to have bothered anyone else... For example, it's over a month since I watched it and I'm still in shock with that long, slow shot of a black man catching fire. It's such a strong, disturbing scene, I could not watch it, had to close my eyes and i was and still am so offended, and I never see anyone discussing what it means in the narrative, either as a meaningful artistic choice or as aggressive, cheap, potentially racist provocation (two things that coexist, of course)

[virginlimbs]

Lucy in the Sky vs. Joker by Andrew Haworth

It makes perfect sense that Lucy in the Sky and Joker came out in the same month. It also unfortunately makes sense that one of them is being hailed as a masterpiece of art cinema while the other is being totally ignored.

I wouldn’t go so far as to call them yin and yang because yin and yang are both valuable properties and Joker is a garbage fire of a movie that many people are huddling around for warmth. But Lucy in the Sky is the antidote for the poison that Joker is putting out into the world.

There’s a lot of similarities. Both movies are based on existing stories that loom heavily in the public consciousness, one fictional and one real. Both stories involve characters that you could write off as crazy. Both (sorry Noah) underutilize Zazie Beetz. But only one of these movies actually tries to make you fully understand its protagonist.

If Todd Phillips directed Lucy in the Sky, it would start with her buying the diapers and the whole movie would be “the car ride with the crazy woman.” But Noah Hawley fixates on something totally different: the idea that hey, if you went to space and saw the Earth, you would come back fucked up!

This is his brilliant starting point. Seeing Natalie Portman in the best performance of her career staring at the Earth in awe like a kid on a plane for the first time, pleading with her boss for just a few more minutes.

When she’s back on Earth, everything else is insignificant. There are lots of issues in her life that demand attention: alcoholic mom, boring too nice husband, brother’s daughter pawned off on her. But she’s enlightened by this experience that .0001 percent of the Earth’s population can relate to. She knows the truth that none of this matters. I’ve seen all of space and time and you wanna ask me what’s for dinner?

So she becomes a nihilist. But while Phillips soaks his movie in that philosophy, Hawley wades through it like a chicken who needs to get to the other side. It is a testament to the strength of the filmmaking and Portman’s performance that I did not feel she had gone capital C Crazy until the last twenty minutes of the movie. Everything she does makes so much sense through her point of view. We roll our eyes at her boring husband, we salivate when Jon Hamm stretches out in the back of a pickup truck, we struggle not to be annoyed by Zazie Beetz just doing her best. And even when Lucy’s lost her mind, we sympathize because Jon Hamm was the one person she could relate to, the one person she could share her secrets with, and he’s the same guy emailing her boss saying she’s too emotional for another trip into space.

Lucy exists in a niche culture made up of the smartest people in the world who should be patting each other on the back every day, but even among her true people she has to prove herself and work extra hard because she’s a woman. A woman trying to hold a family together, caring for her mom and brother’s daughter who she didn’t ask for while Jon Hamm drinks alone in an empty house rewatching the Challenger explosion over and over.

When I was talking with my sister after we saw it, she brought up that the key to the movie’s success is that everyone in it is crazy. To be an astronaut, you have to be a valedictorian who doesn’t care if you live or die. This is not a movie about some crazy woman who tried to kidnap people because she was jealous of a woman stealing her man, the way the story was spun by journalists. This is a movie about a crazy culture where astronauts literally can’t even find the words for what going to space feels like, yet they all nod in total understanding when someone brings it up. And so do we, because the movie never hits us over the head with it. It’s a culture where if you’re not in space, you’re in a cafeteria or sleeping in your office, hiding a six pack of beer under your coat.

Joker, on the other hand, is only interested in over-explaining and lionizing bits of mythology we all already know, standing on the shoulders of a giant. And it’s good at fooling people because moments like Bruce Wayne’s parents being killed are so seared into the collective consciousness that it’s impossible not to feel something when you see it. But moments like Joker getting his name, even more heavy handed than Robin in the Dark Knight Rises or Han in Solo, remind you that behind the camera is an old man turning to you and winking. “See what I did there?”

For a movie that bathes in the river of backstory, all it can come up with for an explanation as to why Joker is crazy is because, well, his parents are crazy. His dad was abusive, but actually it was the mom’s fault somehow, so she deserves to die. You know, the classic scenario. Someone clearly told Todd Phillips about the movie Amour and he was like, yeah that sounds artsy, we’ll smother her with a pillow.

Joker stands for nothing. He means nothing. He is crazy because to a man child, that’s cool, and nothing matters in his world. He’s not even smart. He’s just a dumb lunatic. It makes you yearn for The Dark Knight, a movie which has its cake and eats it too in regards to letting you live in the Joker’s head but come away with the desire to fight for justice in a corrupt world.

Joker is apolitical, amoral, and totally pointless. His speech on the talk show is gibberish. It makes you think of another better movie with a long monologue about capitalism and the crazy world we live in. But the Lupita Nyong’o monologue in Us is towards the beginning, the movie’s jumping off point, while Joker’s is the climax.

Lucy is smart and cunning and crazy in a way that’s impossible not to relate to, crazy in the way we all get when someone hurts our feelings, or when we feel stuck. In space, she doesn’t have to worry about any of this. And when she comes back to Earth, she wants to be a nihilist to dull the pain. But against all odds, she ends up caring even deeper than before. She falls in love, the least nihilistic thing you can do. And when the dust settles from her existential crisis, she’s forced to remember she has an effect on people, and they have an effect on her. People are tiny when you look at them from the sky, but that’s just an illusion. When you’re back on Earth in reality, the things you do matter.

Lucy tells Jon Hamm that her husband is a better person than both of them. But she is not a villain and her husband is not a victim. What she means is he is stable and uncomplicated and doesn’t have the thing that drives them to go to space and risk their lives. Dan Stevens will be fine.

But the character who really gets the short end of the stick is the niece, who wonderfully plays every reaction shot with a look of total bafflement and confusion. She’s just as lost as Lucy, abandoned by her father as well, and just wants someone to lead her through this mess. And it’s not until the end Lucy realizes she’s become her father, putting herself before the little things that need her care in a nihilistic world.

Her speech to Jon Hamm before she sprays him with insect repellant is not the speech of the Joker saying a bunch of crazy nonsense. It’s the cry for help of someone we totally understand, someone who just wanted to be part of something like we all do, who was driven crazy by people who said she was crazy before she was even actually crazy and OF COURSE that would make you crazy. Lucy comes back to Earth numb and confused, thinking people aren’t the answer. But in this confrontational scene she is the most passionate and human she’s ever been.

In a way, Lucy has the last laugh. She has seen into the void and crawled through the muck and dirt of her own emotions and psyche to the other side, like the chicken she always talks about. And on the other side, little things do matter. So she embraces the tiny by suiting up and helping some bees. And just like when the water fills her helmet at NASA, she takes off her mask and lets the bees swarm around her, unafraid, smiling.

What’s she thinking about?

You wouldn’t get it.

[ewh111]

Annual List of Favorite Film Experiences: The 2020 Pandemic Version

Happy new year! So happy to finally arrive at 2021! All the best for a much better new year!!

What a year it was. Since March 12, I've spent 98% of my time within the confines of my condo. The good thing is that as a natural introvert, I have not yet gone stir crazy. I get plenty of social interaction via Zoom. And as a type-2 diabetic, I have been especially careful, staying at home, going out only for essential work or errands, like groceries. I'm grateful that my extended family connected more through the pandemic via weekly 90 minute Zoom family check-ins.

After just two months of work from home, I surpassed the longest time I hadn't been on a plane in over 15 years. (In 2019, I took 42 flights--15 of them international; in 2020, just eight, all prior to the first week of Feb.) As someone who typically travels a lot for work, it's strange to be so stationary. But I'm not complaining. Without the daily commute, travel, and regular schedule of evening and weekend events, I've quietly appreciated the ability to get more sleep, find time to exercise, and even lose some weight. As I reflect upon the past year, I choose to look at the silver-lining and see this period as a positive, massive macro re-balancing of my life.

When things do get back to some semblance of normalcy, the ones who will have the most difficulty adjusting will be these two girls, Freddy and Maxie, who have been so spoiled with attention over the past 10 months.

Now onto this year's favorite film experiences.

What a strange year for film. The last time I experienced a communal movie-going experience was at the Sundance Film Festival back in January. Since 2020 will be remembered as the year of an uber-significant election and home confinement, it seems appropriate to begin this year's conversation with these two themes: democracy and geography, aka places we couldn't travel to.

LESSONS IN DEMOCRACY

Boys State

One of most riveting experiences is my favorite film from the 2020 Sundance Film Festival. This documentary follows four participants in the Texas edition of the week-long Boys State program. The filmmakers lucked out by selecting four boys whose journeys turned out to have fascinating dramatic arcs during the week. What unfolds is a totally engaging microcosm of the political dynamics in the rising generation of voters in America. Trailer: https://youtu.be/E1Kh_T5ZBIM

Hamilton

What a delightful escape from confinement and inability to see live theater by revisiting the stage musical phenomenon via the viewpoints of multi-cameras. It was a new way to appreciate the words, the music, the choreography, and staging of this remarkable work about Alexander Hamilton and his fellow founding fathers. Trailer: https://youtu.be/6s9sNvkjpI0

What the Constitution Means to Me

Missing live theater? Here's another gem to take in. Fast-paced, funny, deeply personal, and defiant, playwright Heidi Schreck plays herself in a mostly one-person show, revisiting her days as a teenager debating the meaning of the Constitution in dingy American Legion halls, linking her personal family history to our country's founding document. Trailer: https://youtu.be/P2zSRdVanDY

Crip Camp

Incredibly inspiring and engaging documentary about Camp Jened, a Catskills summer camp for teens with disabilities in the 1960s and 70s, which prepared many members to become leaders in the movement that eventually led to the passage of the ADA. An important piece of lesser known history and fight for social change and equity. Trailer: https://youtu.be/XRrIs22plz0

TRAVELING WITHOUT LEAVING THE COUCH

My Octopus Teacher (South Africa)

A truly meditative and surprisingly moving documentary. In a kelp forest off the coast of South Africa, a noted underwater photographer documents his, dare I say "friendship," with an octopus whom he visits every day over the course of a year. Trailer: https://youtu.be/b-lbIJHlmbE

76 Days (China)

New York-based filmmaker Hao Wu worked with two journalists in China who recorded harrowing, fly-on-the-wall footage inside four Wuhan hospitals at the epicenter of the COVID-19 outbreak, a clearly risky endeavor unsanctioned by the Chinese government. While this may seem unappealing to watch as we still struggle with the crisis, this apolitical, humanizing, compassionate, and ultimately uplifting film documents and honors the courageous doctors and nurses and their relationships with patients and family members grappling with the unfolding crisis over the course of the full 76 day lock-down in Wuhan. Trailer: https://youtu.be/x_f6-jhbsR4

Your Name Engraved Herein (Taiwan)

The highest ever grossing LGBTQ film in Taiwan, as well as its most popular domestic film in 2020, this is a sensitive, poignant, slow-burn story of coming out and first love in an all-boys Catholic school in a still socially-repressive Taiwan immediately after the lifting of martial law in 1987. Trailer: https://youtu.be/mzfVBg54BGw

A Sun (Taiwan, again)

Driven driving instructor father + marginalized night-club hairstylist mother + high achieving, golden child # 1 son + disowned black sheep younger son serving time in juvenile prison = unhappy family. This multiple winner of Taiwan's version of the Oscar, A Sun is an intricate, engaging, character-driven family drama full of disappointment, redemption-seeking, and tragic setbacks, but uplifting in the end. Trailer: https://youtu.be/LBogLcE2wNQ

Gunda (Norway)

An unusual viewing experience, I did not expect to be so drawn in and highly moved by this intimate, up-close and personal barnyard portrait. A totally mesmerizing and beautifully filmed, black and white, wordless and scoreless documentary (only ambient farm sounds with no humans in sight)--just a sow named Gunda and her piglets with interludes by a one-legged rooster and herd of cows. And yes, there's a subtle message. Trailer: https://youtu.be/05Gc2lANyTQ

The Painter and the Thief (Norway, again)

An intriguing and fascinating documentary about the strange and complicated story of a female Czech artist, whose two most important paintings are stolen from an Oslo art gallery in broad daylight, and the thief who turns out to be an addiction-addled male nurse who she unexpectedly befriends during the trial. Trailer: https://youtu.be/LKBiKDZSf_c

Mucho Mucho Amor (Puerto Rico)

The story of the iconic fortune-teller with millions of followers in the Spanish-speaking world: the bedazzled and caped, effervescently flamboyant, gender non-confirming, Puerto Rican television astrologer Walter Mercado. Disappearing from the airwaves without a trace in 2007 after decades of daily uplifting telecasts, no one knew what happened or where he had gone. Until these filmmakers tracked him down. Here, they tell his story in this loving portrait of the legend, in time to participate in an exhibition dedicated to his 50 year career at a Miami museum before his death last year. Trailer: https://youtu.be/XEJqiucxyrs

Welcome to Chechnya (Russia)

A gut-wrenching and chilling documentary about courageous activists who help LGBTQ individuals flee the repressive regime of Chechnya where violent, homophobic beatings and executions play out regularly and whose leader denies the existence of gay people in his republic. The doc plays like a menacing thriller with the filmmaker going to great lengths to protect the identities using elaborate digital facial disguises. Trailer: https://youtu.be/GlKkj_aHMXk

Tenet (Russia, the Amalfi Coast, Oslo, the future, and the past, among other places)

This is not an easy film to like. One of the most anticipated on my list of "must sees," but the pandemic delayed my viewing till its recent VOD release. Was it worth the wait? Well, it was almost incomprehensible for the first third. But it is here because I'm still thinking about it long after watching and is high on my list to rewatch. To enjoy on first viewing, you should stop trying to figure it out and just let it wash over you and enjoy the ride--it will eventually make (some) sense. Despite all its complexities, Christopher Nolan's ambitious concept boils down to a simple plot: rich Russian bad guy (Kenneth Branagh) wants to end the world and an unnamed secret agent-type guy known only as the Protagonist (John David Washington) tries to stop him. Oh, and there's reverse entropy. And inverted time. And yeah, there are spectacular scenes with time moving forward and backwards at the same time. Like its title, the film is one giant palindrome. Trailer: https://youtu.be/AZGcmvrTX9M

Apollo 11 (Space)

Watching this documentary is like witnessing Neil Armstrong, Michael Collins, and Buzz Aldrin's mission unfold before your eyes live, in real time. Put together from previously unreleased, stunningly crisp, and beautiful archival footage and communications audio from NASA, this is a breathtaking experience that captures the awe of the achievement without talking heads or commentary. Trailer: https://youtu.be/tpLrp0SW8yg

HOW TO DEAL WITH DEATH

Soul

This time out, Pixar tackles existential questions, like what it means to be alive and what is the "before life" in this metaphysically jazzy and terrifically "soulful" film featuring a predominantly Black cast. Trailer: https://youtu.be/xOsLIiBStEs

Dick Johnson is Dead

One would not expect a filmmaker's decision to document her father's descent into old age and dementia to be such an enjoyable and amusing ride. The result is a uniquely comic and bittersweet approach on how to handle his mortality, including envisioning and staging various ways he might accidentally hasten death. Her inspired choice to embrace the time left with her father in this way is endearing and touching without being sentimental. (And the director happens to be a college classmate: Kirsten Johnson, Brown '87.) Trailer: https://youtu.be/wfTmT6C5DnM

AND THREE MORE

Mank

David Fincher masterfully tells the tale of Herman Mankiewicz, the writer of Citizen Kane. Part social history, part examination of the underbelly of Hollywood's Golden Age, part homage to Orson Welles and Citizen Kane, the film is beautifully and evocatively shot in lush black and white with standout performances by Gary Oldman as Mank, Amanda Seyfried as Marion Davies, and a screenplay by Fincher's late father, Jack. Trailer: https://youtu.be/aSfX-nrg-lI

David Byrne's American Utopia

An exhilarating and spirited concert film by Spike Lee who beautifully captures the exuberant grey-suited, bare-footed David Byrne and his similarly wardrobed bandmates on a minimalist stage--a perfect remedy for home-confined and connection-starved human beings during these unusual times. The Byrne-Lee pairing perfectly "makes sense" as you take in the penultimate number, a cover of Janelle Monáe’s "Hell You Talmbout." Trailer: https://youtu.be/lg4hcgtjDPc

Sound of Metal

A character study of self-discovery and emotional truths, Riz Ahmed gives a riveting performance as a heavy metal rock drummer who suddenly loses his hearing. The immersive experience is enhanced with the film's amazing sound design. Trailer: https://youtu.be/VFOrGkAvjAE

HONORABLE MENTIONS

Borat Subsequent Moviefilm (perhaps the film most representative of the craziness of 2020), Ma Rainey's Black Bottom (great performances by Viola Davis and Chadwick Boseman), The Personal History of David Copperfield, Da 5 Bloods, The Way I See It, The Invisible Man, Trial of the Chicago 7, I Lost My Body, The Life Ahead, Wolfwalkers, The Bee Gees: How Do You Mend A Broken Heart. 

In the Queue

Minari, Nomadland, Bacurau, Small Axe, Beanpole, The Forty Year Old Version. 

2020: THE YEAR OF NON-STOP STREAMING

Honestly, given the lack of traditional theatrical releases, I did spend an inordinate amount of time streaming shows than I normally would. It has made me wonder about the challenges of narrative storytelling in the 90-120 minute format vs. the longer episodic format which is so much more conducive to storytelling and character development.

MY TOP 30-SOME FAVORITE PANDEMIC STREAMING EXPERIENCES 

In descending order of bingey-ness--is that a word?--i.e., inability to stop watching episode after episode. (And occasional commentary...)

Dark (Netflix)--I gave this German series a special shout-out last year (Twin Peaks + Stranger Things + The Wire + time travel), and season 3 finally arrived this summer. So good, I devoured it twice in one week. Complex, mind-bending, and addictively dense storytelling with time travel that makes sense (Tenet, take note) and super satisfying series finish. Ultimately unraveling the intertwined family tree of all the time-traveling characters will make your head spin for days. 

Money Heist (Netflix)--I needed something to replace my addictive need after Dark, and four seasons of this Spanish heist/thriller fit the bill perfectly. Plus, I think the series is rich in lessons on organizational behavior and leadership development/dynamics. Dissertation, anyone?

The Umbrella Academy (Netflix)--Not a genre I typically find appealing (superheroes), but I loved the combination of family dysfunction, sibling rivalry, humor, and more time travel. After finishing the two seasons, I really missed the characters and can't wait for next season. And as a JFK assassination buff, I loved that season 2 took place in Dallas,1963.

The Queen's Gambit (Netflix)--Girl survives car crash in which mom dies, grows up to be charming woman who is addicted to alcohol and does chess.

The Flight Attendant (HBO Max)--Girl survives car crash in which dad dies, grows up to be charming woman who is addicted to alcohol and serves first class. But not anything like The Queen's Gambit.

The Great* (Hulu)--Wickedly dark comedic period piece (Catherine the Great's 18th century Russia) with colorblind casting where scheming powerful people plot to get out of loveless marriage.

Bridgerton (Netflix)--A light romantic period piece (Regent era England) with colorblind casting where scheming powerful people and debutantes try to get into marriage and maybe find love.

Tiger King (Netflix)

The Crown (Netflix)

Sex Education (Netflix)

The Last Dance (Netflix)

Better Call Saul (Netflix)

Never Have I Ever (Netflix)--Best narrator ever!

Ozark (Netflix)

Watchmen (HBO Max)

Ugly Delicious 2 (Netflix)--David Chang is back with interesting take on food and culture. The classism of steak-eating?

Flavorful Origins (Netflix)

The Great British Baking Show Season 11 (Netflix)

Pen15 (Hulu)

Mrs. America (Hulu)

The Good Place (Netflix)

Ted Lasso (Apple TV)

Alex Rider (Prime)

Love, Victor (Hulu)

Giri/Haji (Netflix)

Ratched (Netflix)

The Undoing (HBO Max)

Lovecraft Country (HBO Max)

Zerozerozero (Prime)

Industry (HBO Max)

The Boys (Prime)

What We Do In the Shadows (Hulu)

We Are Who We Are (HBO Max)

Pose (Netflix)

Normal People (Hulu)

Indian Matchmaking (Netflix)

Middleditch & Schwartz (Netflix)

Schitts Creek (Netflix)--Don't be put off by this comic treasure being so low on the binge scale. The series gets better with each season, and I'm slowly watching it because I know the end is coming, and I don't want it to end.

[nofomoartworld]

Hyperallergic: A Documentary About Syrian Refugees Undermines Its Subjects

Still from A Syrian Love Story (all images from the movie’s trailer)

On the afternoon of October 18, 2011, from my desk at Syria Today Magazine in Damascus, I tried to track down a missing filmmaker. “Hey,” I emailed a British photographer friend also based in the capital. “We noticed this morning that one Sean McAllister is reported to have gotten arrested in Syria — he’s been here for months — and all his videos (of people saying nice things about the government) seized … does anybody know if he’s contacted anybody — I mean, how disappeared is he?”

McAllister’s arrest was first reported in Arabic on the Facebook pages of local revolutionary coordination committees, warning anyone he’d filmed to flee the country immediately or face arrest and torture. The family he’d been filming — Raghda, Amer and their two boys — did escape, first to Lebanon and then to France. A Syrian Love Story is McAllister’s take on their journey: the boys’ coming of age and the unraveling of their parents’ marriage.

Confinement, literal and figurative, is a central theme of the film. The couple fall in love in prison, and the tension between their roles as comrades, parents, and spouses drives the film’s conflict. At its outset, Syrian prison has made a gaping hole in the family, with Amer and the boys suffering Raghda’s absence as she serves a nine-month sentence for her activism. In Lebanon, exile becomes another, larger jail, which Raghda tries to escape by leaving her family and returning to Syria. Her departure traps Amer in a limbo where, he says, “my heart is broken every day.” Raghda eventually returns, and on the strength of her status as a former political prisoner, the family is granted visas to France. There, the couple’s marriage disintegrates as their children assimilate.

Raghda’s problem, as Amer sees it, is that she cannot be both “Che Guevara and a mother.” Raghda’s problem, as she sees it, is that everyone wants her to take care of them, but no one takes care of her. The couple’s problem, as their sons see it, is that though they’re physically free in France, they are still emotionally locked in “a big cage” of trauma.

Still from A Syrian Love Story

Eventually, Amer leaves his wife for a Frenchwoman, finding peace in “being quiet.” Raghda attempts suicide, recovers, and continues to advocate for the revolution she cannot stand to abandon. Both parents see themselves as building a future for their children: Amer in quiet France, Raghda in unquiet Syria.

The film’s strength lies in its ability to situate the impact of vastly violent conflict in an intimate personal context. In the moment of McAllister’s arrest, which is narrated over footage of detained Syrians being beaten, the filmmaker has literally, if accidentally, put himself on the line for the sake of witnessing history. Within this framework, the film has an opportunity to do delicate, powerful work exploring the intersection of national trauma with the strains of domestic life.

But it does not do this work. Instead, like its subjects, it gets trapped within the limits of its own choices. Foremost, by confining dialogue between McAllister and his subjects to English — a language none of the Syrians are proficient in — it severely undermines not only their abilities to express themselves (in phrases so choppy they must be subtitled) but also the scope of the questions McAllister asks them: “Are you happy/sad?” “Are things good now in France?”

Still from A Syrian Love Story

This obstruction of adequate self-expression is especially heartbreaking as Raghda and Amer try and fail to rebuild their relationship on camera by communicating their respective positions. When Raghda chokes up as she tries to explain her flashbacks to prison, it is impossible to know whether her silences are due to trauma or lack of English vocabulary. Either way, by denying its protagonists the means to fully articulate themselves, the film unwittingly echoes, on an aesthetic level, the political repression they paid dearly for challenging, even while mining the pathos of their marital breakdown.

Equally frustrating is the film’s exclusion of the Syrian context from its vision of life in exile. This especially damages its treatment of Raghda, who suffers precisely from her desire to remain faithful to two core commitments simultaneously: her politics and her family. Once the flawed revolution disappears from the screen, so does the meaning — on her terms — of her struggle. With the failing revolution invisible, Raghda looks, particularly in the scene when she has just attempted suicide, like a slovenly, unfit mother, chain-smoking and avoiding eye-contact with the British man filming her and asking why she feels that “everything is bad.” Perhaps she feels bad because two of her loves — revolution and husband — have betrayed her! But we cannot know, and by eliding everything that is happening in Syria, the film winds up taking Amer’s side, reinforcing the idea that it is better to leave the baggage of the past behind.

Still from A Syrian Love Story

In his post-screening talk, McAllister made it clear that this framing, wherein the film “completely lost a lot of the context … worked for what we wanted to do, which is make a bigger audience as possible in a TV market and tell a human story.” But this is wanting to have one’s cake and eat it too. The lynchpin of this love story is its genesis in protest and its subjects’ tortured ties to that history, which is still ongoing. Without that fundamental dramatic structure, the protagonists would have no agon, no heroic struggle, and there would be no story to tell.

By largely reducing the scope of the story to a he-said, she-said formulation, the film misses the chance to raise vital questions for its audiences. How can love in a Syrian context be usefully translated into a Western one, where love and freedom are packaged and imagined largely in personal, apolitical, neoliberal consumer terms? How do the broader and equally difficult commitments involved in a Syrian love story — to dignity, to human rights, to the rule of law —challenge the generic Hollywood romance, which presumes that the fall of Troy is redeemed by Brad Pitt’s Achilles seducing a pretty POW? For better or worse, what we need now is art that is capable, if not of giving all the answers, at least of asking the crucial questions.

A Syrian Love Story will be screened on March 29 during TIFF’s Human Rights Watch Film Festival.

The post A Documentary About Syrian Refugees Undermines Its Subjects appeared first on Hyperallergic.

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