Planet of the Arabs on Sabbah's blog. Check it out.
A similar film that uses montage to the same effect is T.V's Promised Land, which was made after September 11th.
While I appreciate what these films are attempting to do, i.e exposing the racist representations of Arabs and Muslim in Hollywood and the media generally, I do find that they have a limited appeal, especially if the audience is not the "converted." Some dismiss them by saying that Hollywood stereotypes everybody. Others resist the editorializing that is involved in putting the montage together (this is more applicable to Promised Land) and feel that the director is using the same reductionist and manipulative techniques he's criticizing. One can argue that the director is doing that on purpose to draw attention to the propagana the ordinary American is exposed to on daily basis and to give a "taste of your own medicine" kind of thing. But the audience I was watching the film with didn't buy it--at least not all of them.
In other words, aren't these films preaching to the converted?
8 comments:
I really like & support Jackie Salloum's work as an artist and I do look forward to her film on Palestinian hip hop, but I think the planet film is problematic.
when we talk about racism in the media, we don't have to trot out a hundred racist images and words. TO repeat them is to reify them.
I think the film is useful in a media studies classroom or some place where it will be contextualized. That said, the film is overwhelming and powerful, so it does make its point about Arabs in hollywood and the climate of arab=terrorist that has been created these days. I'm appreciative of any work that is deconstructing the visual and discursive mess we see daily.
Arab artists have to avoid the trappings and not create NEW images that popular culture will gravitate toward.
a valid criticism about the repetition. And like you, I appreciate these movies and their makers. I still wonder who is the intended audience? Arab Americans and their friends or a public that consumes these images on daily basis but is for the most unaware of them? I feel they are more successful with the first group, not the second. I'm basing this on a limited number of showings.
do you have any particular new images in mind that are created by Arab Americans and are being appropriated by the media?
I think that to a large extent, yes, such films are made for sympathetic audiences. For the greater public audience at-large, it's a mixed bag. Atleast such films put some ideas out there in to the general public that run counter to the status quo or discuss what is not addressed at all.
I think that if this film or any film for that reason can be the souce for an emerging dialouge or discourse then the film's impact is evident. If someone who doesn't agree with the film atleast speaks with someone who feels the film carries merit then something may come that benefits both sides. The day that a filmmaker can produce a film that gets its basic, underlying message across clearly and effectively to the wider public will certainly be a day to remember.
I looked evreywhere on the internet for reactions to this movie. I didn't see any preview to this movie, it is mostly on blogs that people posted it without saying any comments, which strengthen the fact that more such efforts to be made in this regards.
Hi Haybro26,
I agree. I think they can open a fruitful dialogue.
hi mixmax,
it's not your typical popular film. this is why you may not find reviews.
by new images, I did not mean unique. maybe recycled. I really still do not like Abu Jaber's fiction. I don't think she's been co-opted by mainstream press though.
Sometimes art/literature just reinforces what we think we already know about a culture. I should have been more coherent. By saying new, it sounded like I was suggesting that they were creating new, that is, bizarre or out of the ordinary, images. I might have meant to say renewing or recycling images already out there.
Is there anybody who does like Abu Jaber's fiction? At least no body I know. I really tried to like Crescent but could not believe her two main characters, which didn't help. And that scene with the veiled woman was just out of an orientalist textbook.
And enough about Baklava. Let's talk Knafeh!
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