Why Are Middle-Eastern/Arabic Movies Ignored?

[MortSahlFan]

I chat on dozens of movie sites, and movies from this region are ignored. I must admit I have seen barely more than a dozen or so, but a couple of years ago, after seeing a documentary on TCM, I saw an Egyptian movie (Chit-Chat On The Nile) and it was so different, yet so great. I remember seeing "Cairo '30" (which was probably the best, not my favorite that I mentioned above), "Cairo Station" and "There Is A Man In Our House". I can't remember the others, but I'm guessing they were probably directed by Henry Barakat, and starred Famen Hamama or Omar Sharif. Adapted or written by Mahfouz, who's shown to be one hell of a writer. I actually remember reading about him in Time Magazine when I was a kid. I also remember telling my aunt, who said, "He was kind of perverted" and went on to say how great Khalil Jibran was.

Last year, TCM started showing a documentary series called, "Women Make Film", and they were saying how many women were producers, directors, writers, and leading ladies, of course. I added movies to my watch-list... And a few days ago, someone on another site started an Egyptian thread.

There's some really good Iranian movies. It seems like half are very metaphysical. There's a movie within a movie within a movie. I can't remember the title, but there was one about this little girl actress, and it's done so well, I wasn't sure if it was part of the story, or if it was part of the movie they were filming (which we don't discover until around that time). Abbas Kiarostami is another name. "Close-Up" is an amazing idea, but "Taste of Cherry" is my favorite of his. Even the ending is unique and metaphysical.

What I've admired the most is the writing, regardless of who it is. A lot of social commentary, sometimes political, mixed in with love stories, and always searching for some kind of truth within the main characters. The "heavies" are always boorish and logical, while the third wheel (the single unmarried man) is always the romantic one. The women can't be described. Sensuous, but modest. Romantic, but trying to be responsible. Traditional at times, but constantly breaking with the past. I should point out most of the movies I have seen were from the 1950s and 60s.


"Dry Summer" is an excellent Turkish movie. Great story, acting, etc.

One thing that's common in all of them is the beautiful poetry. With the story, themes, writing, acting, cinematography, music - everything.

I also remember studying the first civilizations in school here in the US.. I still remember reading about the first city of Ur, Mesopotamia, the beginning of alphabet/writing (Sumerian), the wheel, and a million other inventions, such as irrigation, the Tigris and the Euphrates, the pyramids, the center of the three major Abrahamic religions, and this isn't ignored in the movies, even if it's not explicit. Sometimes you'll be watching a love story, and a couple meet by the pyramids, or someone tells their friend to meet them in Mosul, but of course the more intellectual movies mention politics, the history of societies, you name it.... The US is such a young country, there's only so much we can extrapolate and make into a movie with the limited palette.

I also remember reading how one movie in the 1950s had such an influence in Egypt, that it made it much easier for women to divorce. "JFK" is a horrible movie (Jim Garrison is the hero, not stone) but it also helped to change the law when it came to transparency.

I'm obsessed with chronology, capturing the zeitgeist (as opposed to the typical world events) in part to learn about history, trends, influence, comparing fiction with real life for its time, evolution of film, so I would start with the earliest movies, and move forward, to see how they got here at this point in history. I would see more, but finding subtitles can be tough, but there are some movies on YouTube (usually the popular ones, not the best) and one I really liked from 1972 that I saw yesterday after scrolling around Prime and seeing the interesting title, "Empire M", and it's a really unique movie. I just saw "The River of Love" but the translations could use improvement, and I might try to upload my own.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aeobF02KPeI&t=1313s

[chveik]

i dunno really, american cultural imperialism must play some part

There's some really good Iranian movies. It seems like half are very metaphysical. There's a movie within a movie within a movie. I can't remember the title, but there was one about this little girl actress, and it's done so well, I wasn't sure if it was part of the story, or if it was part of the movie they were filming (which we don't discover until around that time).

Jafar Panahi's The Mirror.

[Mister Six]

I suppose most non-English-speaking, non-Western movies get ignored, don't they? And those that get the backing tend to be viewed through an American-compatible lens.

Bollywood is a massive industry but basically only known for aesthetic borrowings in the West, in stuff like Slumdog Millionaire. Can't think of a non-South African African film that's got much attention, but there must be some good stuff. Russia nobody thinks about post-fall of Communism.

Chinese films are notable only when they're Hong Kong-related (imperial hangovers, and of course HK's golden age was pre-handover to China) or there's some kind of "the film they tried to ban" narrative (Farewell My Concubine, A Touch of Sin). Japanese films have that post-US pseudo-imperial link (plus they had superior soft power back when they were the next global superpower, something China has squandered, so anime was able to make good inroads in the 80s) and South Korean films (and now TV) get a revival every 20 years or so. But you don't hear much about Southeast Asia, do you?

I suppose a bit of stuff filters up from the Spanish/Portuguese sections of the American continent, but not a lot. And obviously the Canadians all just move to Hollywood and naturalise.

The only Middle Eastern films I can recall seeing off the top of my head are Children of Heaven and A Separation, both of which were noted by the Oscars, so I suppose I'm as much a part of the problem as anyone else.

[bgmnts]

Is Middle Eastern cinema more ignored than any other region bar like Japan and a bit of China, if you're viewing it through a western lens anyway?

[The Culture Bunker]

The only Middle Eastern films I can recall seeing off the top of my head are Children of Heaven and A Separation, both of which were noted by the Oscars, so I suppose I'm as much a part of the problem as anyone else.

Funnily enough, my Iranian partner dismissed the guy who directed A Separation as a complete hack. We watched it to help her sisters with some assignment, and I didn't think it was anything special beyond an examination of the Iranian legal process, which I was assured was an accurate portrayal.

Quite interested in watching this, though:

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/av/world-middle-east-59294328

[chveik]

well there are a few auteurs that get some international recognition in festivals, Bilge Ceylan from Turkey, Suleiman from Palestine but Iranian cinema seems to be the only one that has had a proper aesthetic movement.

plus to get a film industry going you need a relative economic prosperity and when your country's been bombed to fuck or subject to trade sanctions it makes things difficult. and you have to add the hardcore censorship in the Arabian peninsula for instance.

[MortSahlFan]

A guy on another site (from Turkey) said he has no interest because he knows the culture.. But most don't know it, which you'd think would be alluring.

[dissolute ocelot]

I don't think it's any more neglected than many regions, certainly a reflection of the lack of interest in most non-English-language cinema in the UK and US.

Iranian cinema and Turkish cinema (which is distinct from Arab cinema) have both got a lot of attention. For a while Iranian cinema was the darling of the arthouse/film festival circuit, Kiarostami, the Makhmalbafs, etc, although in recent years the liberalisation of the 90s has been crushed and most filmmakers have fled, been censored, or died. I think the situation in Turkey is somewhat similar now, although a lot of Turkish filmmakers, such as Fatih Akın (The Edge of Heaven, etc), have been working in Germany, just as those from French Africa have been working in France.

In the Arabian peninsula media seems even more state-controlled (biopics of Mohammed that never actually depict the prophet), although parts of North Africa have more of a film tradition - Egypt in particular has a long history. And in Muslim west Africa, Abderrahmane Sissako's Timbuktu (from Mauritania) is excellent and highly acclaimed, about Islamic fundamentalism conflicting with locals; the Malian Souleymane Cissé also made some great films like dreamlike desert drama Yeelen.

Sympathy for those in war-torn regions meant the Lebanese film Capernaum (2018) got a fair bit of coverage too, I even heard people discuss it on Radio 1, but it's pretty horrendous imo (awkwardly mixing the mawkish and the brutal). I guess that theme makes it easy to market, compared to some film from other parts of the world where most people have no knowledge of their history. But certainly interested to hear other recommendations of good films.

[MortSahlFan]

I hardly find good movies, but I actually liked "Capernaum".. I think a kid taking care of a toddler was unique.

There's quite a few movies on YouTube.. I've been mostly focusing on Egyptian movies, but I've seen some good Palestinian movies. "Rana's Wedding" was pretty good, and with a different structure - reminded me of Iranian movies.

English is widely known, so those movies will always have more availability, which can lead to the possibility for interest. I would think more movie buffs would like at least a couple. Hell, just for curiosity.

I think part of it is celebrity. People know Bergman is Swedish, but probably can't name 5 other directors from Sweden. Japan and Kurosawa, even Abbas Kiarostami and Iran.

[Herbert Ashe]

I don't think it's any more neglected than many regions, certainly a reflection of the lack of interest in most non-English-language cinema in the UK and US.

This, basically. Related: the tendency for the popular/middlebrow cinema consciousness to focus on 1 or 2 directors from a given country or region, regardless of how representative they actually are. (I think Asghar Farhadi, alluded to above, fits here as someone who is far easier to assimilate to the anglo-european model of art cinema than e.g. Kiarostami/Makhlambaf. and maybe even Capernaum, which to me was a step backwards from Labaki's previous films).


BTW for some interesting context of arab cinema, from 1995:

Laura Mulvey: Could you begin by talking about your relationship with Arabic cinema?

Moufida Tiatli: When the Arab countries won their independence, their first instinct was to build a cinema that would be the exact opposite of the existing Egyptian industry, which they saw as escapist and stultifying. So the initial intention was to build a cinema d'auteurs that would be intellectual and would deal with important themes, such as the condition of women. But the people were bored by these movies, because they were used to Hollywood, or to Indian or Egyptian melodramas.

Today we have a better balance. I think our cinema went through a period of self-criticism, as a result of which something positive emerged. We are coming back to the melodrama, but in a much more nuanced manner. Nowadays our cinema is trying to reach a popular audience, and is branching out into love stories and comedies. The Arab cinema-going public loves to laugh. And to cry. Of course, this new wave of popular film owes a lot to the Egyptian cinema of the 50s, which was a cinema of excess: of both excessive melodramas and excessive comedies.

[El Unicornio, mang]

I did love Kiarostami's "Like Someone in Love" although it's set in Japan.

The only others I can think of are "A Girl Walks Home Alone at Night" (filmed in the US but set in Iran) and "Osama". No aversion to middle-eastern films, just haven't had them pop up on my radar.

[Sebastian Cobb]

Same reason Bollywood is despite having a global audience way bigger than Hollywood I guess.

Mubi does put some on occasionally. They had one where fundamentalists took over a village and it didn't pull his punches. And the first film directed by a Saudi Arabian woman. The latter was interesting as there were lots of scenes shot in the house with family so instead of the traditional conservative headresses people wear over there she was cutting about in quite nice dresses and stuff. You sort of forget about that.