Al-Yad Al-Khadra
Jumana Manna
Palestine | 2022 | 65 min
World premiere
Languages : Arabic, Hebrew
Subtitles : French, English
Foragers interweaves documentary and fiction to report on a searing conflict between the Israel Nature and Parks Authority and Palestinian foragers. Through an elaborate and elegant composition, the film successfully captures the inherited love, resilience and knowledge of these traditions, over an eminently political backdrop.
Foragers interweaves documentary and fiction to report on a searing conflict between the Israeli authorities in charge of parks and nature reserves and Palestinians - in particular, elders - who gather wild plants that are essential to their culture and cuisine. Indeed, the restrictions imposed by the Israelis notably ban the gathering of ’akkoub (similar to artichokes) and za’atar (thyme), and lead not only to equally sad and ludicrous scenes of “hunting” by the patrollers, but also to repeated infringements… Through an elaborate and extremely subtle composition, conversations and the mise en scène of courtroom defences (with, in passing, a woman erroneously called “Varda”; the allusion to the great filmmaker’s documentary about gleaners will not go unnoticed), Jumana Mana – herself Palestinian and clearly intimately connected to her subject – successfully and gracefully captures the inherited love, resilience and knowledge of these traditions, with an eminently political backdrop.
Émilie Bujès
Wild Relativees, 2018
A Magical Substance Flows Into Me, 2015
The Goodness Regime, 2013
A Sketch of Manners, 2013
The Umpire Whispers, 2010
Blessed Blessed Oblivion, 2010
