Showing @ Filmhouse, Edinburgh, Fri 28 & Sat 29 Sep

Emad Burnat, Guy Davidi / Occupied Palestinian Territory/Israel/France/Netherlands / 2011 / 90 min

Seldom do we witness eye-level accounts of Middle-Eastern struggle in the West, due to the failure of delivery and because of how difficult it is for filmmakers to retain their content. The title of this film is testament to that but is also representative of Emad Burnat’s duty to helping his people by recording the tyranny they suffer every day. With the aid of Israeli co-director Guy Davidi, he has been able to produce a heartbreaking, momentous and unforgettable piece of documentary cinema.

Burnat purchases his first camera at the birth of his fourth son, Gibreel, in 2005. But when Israel invades the land to build a West Bank separation fence on the outskirts of Bil’in, he turns the camera onto the front line, where members of the village and nearby farmlands resist the incursion. The conflict is almost told through the eyes of Gibreel as he grows; oblivious, confused, scared but then angry and reactive. Burnat’s footage is often horrifying, capturing acts of premeditated violence by Israeli soldiers on nonviolent protestors and standoffs between both sides. Tear gas rains down and bullets ricochet past Burnat’s camera, on occasion striking the lens. This is devastatingly urgent cinema which must be used as a primary tool for education, if not as a means of galvanising people across the world into action.

Showing as part of the Take One Action Film Festival 2012.
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