The fifth Dubai International Film Festival again fulfilled its promises this year: a level of professionalism on a par with European festival, prestigious rewards... Among the award-winning movies, Masquerades received the prize for the best Arabic feature film. It is a comedy combined with a social satire. Mounir Mekbek, seeking social recognition, announces to his village the forthcoming wedding of his sister with a rich man. The only problem, this groom only exists in his imagination… The light mood paves the way to reveal some specific taboos in the Algerian society. To laugh and criticize, a proven recipe... But why did the jury decide to specifically reward this movie? To win this award the Franco-Algerian production needed to be one step ahead of its competitors, maybe even a “cocktail” of all other movies…

The winning streak might consist in refusing the moaning mode. Contemporary cinema is not a receptacle for all our misfortunes. The director Lyes Salem talks about Masquerades : “I wanted to make a movie that does not move into victimization”.

This was also the stance of Skin, directed by Antony Fabian. To evoke the life of Sandra Laing, a black skin girl with white parents, living in Apartheid South Africa, of all places, he did not need to present her as a pariah. It’s her destiny and her will to fight against adversity that he wanted to honour. Even when presenting his movie, he stressed that he never perceived Sandra as a victim.

Same denial of ‘victimization’ for the Brazilian director Fernando Meirelles, who achieved a beautiful movie interpretation of Portuguese author Saramengo’s novel Blindness. Respecting the meaning of the word: an apologue destined to confront the contemporary man with his selfish behaviour. Of course, we could feel sympathy for the destiny of these people who suddenly lose eyesight, but the real purpose of the movie is elsewhere…

Another recipe for success: the refusal of preconceived ideas. This is what Lyes Salem in talking about his movie explains: “I absolutely wanted to break away from some misery-focused clichés about the Algerian world”.

The director Najwa Najjar displays a similar attitude. The heroine of her movie Al Mor Wa Al Rumman (Pomegranates and Myrrh) ends up coping with her situation and the Palestinian reality through a derivative: dance. The inner strength of the characters is also very true.

This perspective is again shared by the German director Marcus Vetter. Das Herz Von Jenin (The Heart of Jenin) dives into the heart of the Palestinian problem through the marvellous project of a father, originally Arabic, who accepts to give the organs of his dead son to five children of different religions. The documentary represents the adventure of this man, Ismael Khatib, a true humanist, who also attempts to go beyond clichés.

Finally, a good movie also relies on its characters. Talking about his, Lyes Salem wrote: “Rym and Khliffa are like two butterflies who are seeking an issue in the closed-up paralysis of the conformism they live in”.

In Iranian director Majid Majidi’s movie Avaze Gonjeshk – Ha (The Song of Sparrows), the father would be a night butterfly that learns how to survive in the city while he grew up working in an ostrich farm. The son would be a day butterfly dreaming of aquatic creatures’ surroundings. The characters are a symbol, and the way to film their universe, the ostriches or the fish lying on the floor, tells their tale…

Clearly, if the Franco-Algerian movie combined all the keys to success, the Dubai festival with its tapestry of challenging portraits counts many productions that touched the audience.

”DIFF is in a perfect position to showcase cinema (…), being a crossroads between Asia, Africa, Europe, and points beyond “. Listening to Masoud Amralla Al Ali, the Artistic Director of the project, we can only hope that it continues to propose a plethora of styles, genres and cultural windows in the future.

Clothilde Monat (Jan-Feb09 Issue)

More info about the festival on www.dubaifilmfest.com