This screening is part of: MY HOMELAND IS NOT A SUITCASE: ANNEMARIE JACIR, EMILY JACIR, AND DAR JACIR FOR ART AND RESEARCH

Film Notes

PART 1: ANNEMARIE JACIR
Over the past twenty years, Annemarie Jacir has established herself as one of the preeminent Palestinian filmmakers in contemporary cinema, having written and directed three remarkable feature films and numerous shorter works. Her feature debut, SALT OF THIS SEA (2008) was the first feature-length narrative film by a Palestinian woman, and her subsequent features – WHEN I SAW YOU (2012) and WAJIB (2017) – have been widely acclaimed. Alongside her filmmaking, Annemarie Jacir has furthered the cause of Palestinian cinema through her work as a curator. She has organized numerous programs and festivals, above all the pioneering “Dreams of a Nation” project (2003). The first Palestinian film festival to take place in NYC, “Dreams of a Nation” traveled throughout Palestine the following year, and marked the first screenings within Palestine itself of many of the foundational works of Palestinian cinema.

Annemarie Jacir
WHEN I SAW YOU / LAMMA SHOFTAK
2012, 93 min, 35mm-to-DCP. In Arabic with English subtitles.
1967: the world is alive with change: brimming with reawakened energy, new styles, music, and an infectious sense of hope. In Jordan, a different kind of change is underway as tens of thousands of refugees pour across the border from Palestine. Having been separated from his father in the chaos of war, Tarek, 11, and his mother, Ghaydaa, are amongst this latest wave of refugees. Placed in “temporary” refugee camps made up of tents and prefab houses until they would be able to return, they wait, like the generation before them who arrived in 1948. With difficulties adjusting to life in Harir camp and a longing to be reunited with his father, Tarek searches for a way out, and discovers a new hope emerging with the times. Eventually his free spirit and curious nature lead him to a group of people on a journey that will change their lives.

“A touching, beautiful masterpiece of a film, an ode to the displaced the world over and to any of us who have ever lived somewhere other than our own birth country, yearning for home.” –HUFFINGTON POST