Director Hany Abu-Assad’s Paradise Now won the 2005 Golden Globe Award for best foreign film and was nominated for an Oscar for best foreign film. This controversial film, arriving during highly political times, examines the lives of two young Palestinians who decide they must fulfill their destinies by executing a suicide bombing mission in Tel Aviv. Their conviction that their cause to end Israeli occupation of the West Bank is justified at any cost, and their hesitancy to act on it without doubt, frame this story of their desire to find righteousness in a world that offers them no solace. We are given the chance to observe terrorists as real people who must deal with their unfortunate situation.
Some have argued that allowing Paradise Now to act as a vehicle for the justification and legitimization of terrorism is injurious and distasteful and petitioned the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Science to withdraw its nomination. “By ignoring the film's message and the implications of this message,” states the petition, “those that chose to award this film a prize have become part of the evil chain of terror and accomplices to the next suicide murders.” It is understandable that Israelis who have experienced suicide bombings would find Paradise Now objectionable. To them, Palestinian militants who kill innocent people in acts of self-indulgent terrorism should not be given any voice. Media attention lends great power for political gain.
Conversely, Paradise Now also offers people an opportunity to understand the Arab-Israeli conflict through the eyes of two young Palestinian men, Said and Khaled, who have to live with the consequences of others' political decisions. Like all humans, they want a home. Here we are able to find common ground as we recognize that these men are not necessarily evil terrorists who kill without conscience. As the counter-petition states, Paradise Now is a “story about the suffering of Palestinians and how a life of desperation can lead to an act of desperation.”
There are two sides to every story, as the counter-petition also notes. I believe that Abu-Assad brilliantly reveals that truth in Paradise Now. Said and Khaled are not heroes nor are they demons. As such, there are no easy answers, nor are there any offered in the film. Which is what makes it so compelling, and yet so tragic. Paradise Now does not glorify terrorism. As an art form, it reveals to us without judgment a part of humanity and makes us begin to contemplate an answer.
Some have argued that allowing Paradise Now to act as a vehicle for the justification and legitimization of terrorism is injurious and distasteful and petitioned the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Science to withdraw its nomination. “By ignoring the film's message and the implications of this message,” states the petition, “those that chose to award this film a prize have become part of the evil chain of terror and accomplices to the next suicide murders.” It is understandable that Israelis who have experienced suicide bombings would find Paradise Now objectionable. To them, Palestinian militants who kill innocent people in acts of self-indulgent terrorism should not be given any voice. Media attention lends great power for political gain.
Conversely, Paradise Now also offers people an opportunity to understand the Arab-Israeli conflict through the eyes of two young Palestinian men, Said and Khaled, who have to live with the consequences of others' political decisions. Like all humans, they want a home. Here we are able to find common ground as we recognize that these men are not necessarily evil terrorists who kill without conscience. As the counter-petition states, Paradise Now is a “story about the suffering of Palestinians and how a life of desperation can lead to an act of desperation.”
There are two sides to every story, as the counter-petition also notes. I believe that Abu-Assad brilliantly reveals that truth in Paradise Now. Said and Khaled are not heroes nor are they demons. As such, there are no easy answers, nor are there any offered in the film. Which is what makes it so compelling, and yet so tragic. Paradise Now does not glorify terrorism. As an art form, it reveals to us without judgment a part of humanity and makes us begin to contemplate an answer.
1 comment:
Lisa, you have a consistent talent for reviewing movies.
In your last paragraph, you say that the film doesn't offer any answers. I think that may be an arguable point. Ostensibly that may seem like the case, but I think the movie is expounding against suicide bombers. I got this message through the dialogue and through Khaled's tears at the end. Said's act was driven by hopelessness, but I think the movie wants us to hold on to hope, to a better way of resolving the crisis than through death and being a so-called martyr and perpetuation of this vicious cycle.
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