Fiche Film
Cinéma/TV
COURT Métrage | 2010
End of September
Pays concerné : Territoire palestinien
Durée : 25 minutes
Genre : drame
Type : fiction

Français

écrit et réalisé par
Sama Alshaibi et Ala’ Younis

2010, court métrage, 25 min
End of September
Une production jordanienne, Palestinienne et irakienne

2009/2010

English

End of September re-orients Palestinian history by linking the past, present, and fantastical future. »Dalal » (actress Majd Hijjawi), a female fadai (freedom fighter) returns to Palestine in shifts of time. Challenged by the results of the end of Israeli occupation, Dalal journeys through the Holy Land in search of fellow fedai « Jad » (played by actor Firas Taybeh). Betrayed by her own history, Dalal’s relives the re-produced/recycled Palestinian plight.

Written and directed by Sama Alshaibi and Ala’ Younis
Produced by GreyScale Films and Raya wa Sakina
Independent short film 2009/2010
Filmed in Palestine and Jordan

End of September (2010) is a magical realist, psychological thriller written and directed by Sama Alshaibi and Ala’ Younis, and co produced with GreyScale Films. The film re-orients Palestinian history by linking the past, present, and fantastical future. It challenges the hopes for what an « end of occupation » would result in by looking forward and backward into the re-produced and recycled injustices of the
Palestinian plight.

Dalal (played by Majd Hijjawi) is the valiant Palestinian protagonist whose return to the Palestinian/Israeli state spans across time-periods. The past is based on historical accounts, and its future on speculative imaginings.

The film begins with Dalal in either a place of limbo or a futuristic state that is marked by the confusion of non-linear time. She encounters a mysterious world, suspicious and confused by the orientalist and commodified spiritual idolatry set within a religious vacuum in the « Holy Land » of Palestine. Dalal struggles with feelings of alienation in which she, the Palestinian and a fighter in the resistance, is now the stranger to the land.

Her journey has triggered a « return » to Jaffa with a group of Palestinian fedayeen (freedom fighters) by rubber boat in the late 1970’s. The cinematic unfolding depicts the fedayeen almost divorced of scene, where the soldiers stand out as stark and prominent under their green uniforms. Utilizing the cinematic style of almost a static shutter frame, it contextualizes the framework in which the international image of the « fedayeen » was set in history: young men without a past, country, or cause. In short, mass media has reduced their image to gun, body, uniform, and anger. Kidnappings and hijackings were historically the only framework in which the international world would see the agents of the Palestinian cause.

End of September recognizes the historical « making » of the Fedai image (divorced of scene and playing upon the image of gun/body/uniform) and how it lives in the popular imagination. However, the compulsory following of the dramatic quality of a kidnapped bus maintains the Fedayeen as iconic symbols of the Palestinian national movement but adds dimensions to their image by dignifying and humanizing the two main Fedai characters, Dalal and Jad (played by Firas Taybeh).

End of September invites interpretations that challenge and raise questions about whose story is credible and authentic. Her return with a bus links her current purpose with that of her Fedai past. She enters through a checkpoint guarded by soldiers, a rudimentary and weak likeness of the border agents of its dominant past. Dalal struggles with feelings of alienation in which she, the Palestinian, and the symbol of resistance, is the stranger to the land. This continued assault of injustice is magnified and re-presented in symbolic reminders of other violations over Palestinian land.

The film’s magical realist perspective characterizes Dalal’s representation and continued presence (without aging) in non-linear time shifts. In particular scenes, Dalal’s attempt to connect with this future, particularly Jad, blurs the film’s distinction between the magical and reality. This technique also suggests questions about Palestine’s future, distancing the plot from a fixed outcome that is easily summarized. As such, the film’s conclusion extends past a singular definition and is alive and expansive in the audience’s imagination and is reflective of the filmmakers’ multiplicitous intentions.

End of September concludes where the rational and irrational are not opposite and conflicting realities. They are in fact integrated within the lives of the film’s characters, and within the presence of what comprises historical « truth. » The demise of the either/or world of villains and heroes is marked by the decay of a controlled message in both popular culture and within our own society. End of September looks into the complexity of perception, of reality and of a vision for a Palestinian future.

Cast:
Dalal__ Majd Hijjawi
Jad__ Firas Taybeh
Renactor 1__ Ameen Malhas
Renactor 2__ Huzima Jaber
Fedai 1__ Rafat Lafi
Fedai 2__ Kamal Awad
Fedai 3__ Rami Omari
Fedai 4__ Mohammad Abu Haltam
Old Woman__ Sama Alshaibi
Bus Woman 1__ Mona Amareen
Bus Woman 2__ Dima Al Ahmad
Bus Woman 3__ Serene Al Ahmad
Man in Bus 1__ Khaldoun Albaz
Man in Bus 2__ Aktham Al Sayegh
Man in Bus 3__ Eyad Salame
Guru__ Isam Uraiqat
Spa 1__ Rafique Nasereddin
Spa 2__ Ayah Younis
Spa 3__ Wikar Kadhim
Spa 4__ Lana Cattan
Spa 5__ Eyad Salameh
Spa 6__ Khaldoun Albaz
Spa 7__ Lorena Angela
Nakba Man 1__ Mamdouh Younis
Nakba Man 2__ Khaldoun Albaz
Nakba Man 3__ Bilal Saudi
Nakba Woman 1__ Ayah Younis
Nakba Woman 2__ Noura Al Khasawneh
Nakba Woman 3__ Ala’ Younis
Nakba Woman 4__ Loma Al Shamayleh

Director of Photography: Abdel Salam Akkad
Second Camera: Danny Amir
Additional Camera Work: Sama Alshaibi
Colorist: Eyad Hamam
Location Manager: Ala’a Abbad
Gaffer: Dany Amir
Soundman 1: Hasan Ameen
Soundman 2: Amer Dwaik
Soundman 3: Adnan Bushnaq
Production Assistant: Mohammad Suhweil
Additional Production: Abdullah Rahhal, Qais Shawabkeh, Abdulmajed Elias
Stills: Sama Alshaibi, Ali Saadi
Editors: Sama Alshaibi, Ala’ Younis, Eyad Hamam, Jeejung Kim
Costume Designer: Maha Yacoubi Cantello
Wardrobe: Phaedra Dahdaleh
Props: Karim Khair
Props fabricator: Gwenyth Scally
Location Permissions by: Royal Film Commission
Recording Studio: Yacoub Abu Gosh Studio, Amman

Website Design: Ala’ Younis

Locations:
Darat Al Funun, Amman Jordan
Hamam Al Basha, Amman, Jordan
Mary’s House, Bethlehem, Palestine
Souk Jara, Amman, Jordan
Jerusalem, Bethlehem and Dheisheh Refugee Camp, Palestine
Amman, Salt, Dead Sea and Sama Al Rousan, Jordan

Executive Producer:
Darat al Funun – The Khalid Shoman Foundation
Rana Sadik and Samer Younis

Produced by:
GreyScale Films
Raya wa Sakina

Written and Directed by
Sama Alshaibi and Ala’ Younis

End of September
a Jordanian, Palestinian and Iraqi production


Thanks to:
Suha Shoman and Darat al Funun
Rana Sadik and Samer Younis
The Royal Film Commission
The Alshaibi/Yacoubi Family
The Younis Family
The office staff at GreyScale Films
Khaldoun Albaz
Usama Alshaibi
Ahmad Ameen
Omar Atout
Elie Domit
Marvin, Mahmood and Zakiriya Gladney
Rula Halawani
Maha Yacoubi Cantello
Samar Martha, Art School Palestine
Rula Nasser
Ameer Qaimari
Moaz Qaimari
Nader Qaimari
Haneen Rishmawi
Ayah Younis
Heba Younis
Mamdouh Younis
Al Mamal Foundation, Jerusalem
The Empty Quarter, Dubai
Selma Feriani Gallery, London

2009/2010

CONTACT
email :
endofsept at gmail.com
www.end-of-september.com
http://g-riot.com/endofsept/index.html

© Sama Alshaibi and Ala’ Younis
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