Alexandra Dols is an author, director and producer. She cofounded Hybrid Pulse and within it, coproduced and directed several short and two feature documentaries, MOUDJAHIDATE (2008, 75’) and BEYOND THE FRONTLINES (2017, 113’).
A contributor to French website Le cinéma est politique [Movies are politics], she has also been teaching visual literacy in a self-defense perspective in working-class neighborhoods since 2009.
Issues of power and image are a core component of her transdisciplinary work.
In 2017, she co-published Dr. Samah Jabr’s first book, with French publishing house PMN Editions.
DIRECTOR’S NOTE
Day-to-day colonization does not only involve occupying land, homes, the sky or water. It does not seek to impose its rule through weapons only. It molds the minds as well, beyond the frontlines.
Our movie deals with the invisible aspects of colonization, i.e. intimate occupation, occupation of the mental space. Within this context, mental balance, self-esteem, state of mind, the soul: all these become spaces and issues of resistance.
The audience is made to understand and feel oppression and suffocation, just as much as the vital breath and sumood of Palestinians. Excerpts from columns, interviews and didactic elements mix with artistic experiments.
Editing follows and shapes the two distinct yet intertwined paces of both longstanding transgenerational traumas and sporadic shocks occurring in times of crisis.
Our movie is thick with information and emotions. By distancing itself from the immediacy, and sometimes spectacularisation, of the news, it asserts modesty as a form of aesthetics.
Modesty is necessary to approach and convey pain, hurt bodies and wounded souls. Such modesty enables to film dignity.
I did not want to present one single portrait, but rather suggest plurality through the representation of individuals whose diverse identities, religions, sexual orientations, political cultures, social backgrounds and geographical origins, all come together in their struggle against occupation. This new approach has been recognized by the audience as being intersectional feminism.
Based on the Palestinian case, this documentary is a reflection about mechanisms of domination, alienation and conditions of emancipation. Let us hope that the interviewees’ testimonies will resonate and inspire others well above their own realities.
FILMOGRAPHY
- MINIMUM SYNDICAL fearuring queer members of French labour union “Solidaires” – 26min – 2019
- BEYOND THE FRONTLINES: TALES OF RESISTANCE AND RESILIENCEIN PALESTINE On the psychological consequences of the Israeli occupation and the Palestinians’ resistance and resilience – 113 min – 2017
- WOMEN IN PALESTINE with Dr. Samah Jabr – 11 min – 2015
- QUI SEME LA HAGRA They who Sow the Hagra – 15 min – 2014
- MOUDJAHIDATE women activism for the Algerian independence within the National Liberation Front – 75 min – 2008
- LA TETE DE MA MERE – Work of fiction – 10 min – 2002
PRODUCTION NOTE
Palestine is facing a critical moment in its history. This is a time when, more than ever, cinema must play its role, i.e. gather people around a filmic experience so they can share, learn, feel and finally find the means to act.
This necessity coincides with our desire to begin and broadcast our film, and the Palestinian perspective it embraces, internationally. This would be an opportunity to make the work and thought of Dr. Samah Jabr better known. The main character of our movie, this Palestinian psychiatrist and writer is an heiress to Dr. Frantz Fanon. She seeks to decolonize the minds and the field of psychiatry at the same time.
After a successful release in French movie theaters, and winning the Sunbird Award for Best Documentary Film at the “Days of Cinema” Film Festival in Palestine, we are currently looking for distributors, networks and overall support for international broadcasting.