DUBAI: “Sometimes I would ask myself, ‘Why am I doing this?’” admits Lina Soualem. “But it’s my mission. I wanted to make this film for the memory of all these women. For this story to be able to exist beyond our family.”
The French-Palestinian-Algerian filmmaker and actress is discussing her new documentary, “Bye Bye Tiberias,” which will premiere at the Giornate Degli Autori, an independent sidebar to the Venice International Film Festival, on Sept. 3. Its North American premiere will take place at the Toronto International Film Festival on Sept. 11.
The film’s central character is Soualem’s mother, the Palestinian actress Hiam Abbass, best known for her roles in HBO’s “Succession” and Hulu’s “Ramy,” as well as films including “Munich” and “Blade Runner 2049.” Abbass grew up in the Galilean village of Deir Hanna. In her early 20s, she made the decision to leave her family home and follow her dream of becoming an actress in Europe. Behind her she left her mother, grandmother, and seven sisters.
Hiam Abbass and Lina Soualem in Deir Hanna in “Bye Bye Tiberias.” (Supplied)
It is this decision that is central to “Bye Bye Tiberias.” Reflecting on Abbass’ chosen exile and the ways in which the women of her family have influenced her and her mother’s lives, Soualem’s film portrays four generations of daring Palestinian women, including her great grandmother, Um Ali, her grandmother Nemat, and her great aunt Hosnieh.
“When my mother reads a poem about my great grandmother, we can feel that she is overwhelmed by emotion,” says Soualem, who has appeared in films such as Hafsia Herzi’s “You Deserve A Lover” and Rayhana Obermeyer’s “I Still Hide To Smoke.” “And me, too, because she’s really the source of transmission. For me, she’s the presence that is always there, and she carries so much suffering without really ever complaining about it.
“And the story of my great aunt combines all the tragedy of our family, because it’s the loss of place, it’s the separation from family, it’s the body separated from the soil. I couldn’t imagine being separated from my mother and sister for 30 years. And what is impressive is that, despite all of this, my great aunt seems to be a model of femininity and positivity for my mother. The one who lost the most is the one who taught her the most.”
Um Ali, Lina, Hiam Abbass and Lina Soualem as a baby in the Nineties in “Bye Bye Tiberias.” (Supplied)
“Bye Bye Tiberias” deals with questions of colonial trauma, exile and transmission, as did “Their Algeria,” Soualem’s directorial debut, albeit in different ways. The latter was an emotive and languid exploration of the pain behind her paternal Algerian grandparents’ long journey of exile. The former is more than just a film, says Soualem. It’s memory, justice, legacy and history. Retracing such ground was not easy, especially for Abbass.
“I think it was very difficult for her,” admits Soualem. “I went digging into places that were uncomfortable and I don’t think she ever planned to do this. At the same time, she was very supportive. That’s the contradiction that we’re made of. Because we come from these difficult stories, we want to face them. But we also want to avoid being drawn into them because we want to be able to breathe. It was hard for her to be taken back to all the things she faced a long time ago, but at the same time she felt she needed to do it for me.”
A wedding in Deir Hanna in the 1980s, as shown in “Bye Bye Tiberias.” (Supplied)
Mixing contemporary imagery with archival footage, much of which was shot by Soualem’s father, the French actor Zinedine Soualem, the documentary also includes poetry and two moments of reconstruction. The latter sees Abbass act out pivotal moments in her early life. The former includes a poem written by her grandfather for her grandmother, and a poem by her mother about her great grandmother. Soualem also wrote poetry for the film, which is read onscreen by her mother.
“I wanted my mother to read them because I wanted… the transmission in the film to continue. I wanted to inscribe things, to fictionalize our stories, to bring poetry into these stories. It’s a way of creating our own imaginary territory, in the context of a story in which loss of territory is ongoing and repetitive.
“It’s a very complex film,” adds Soualem. “I didn’t really try to make it easier, because I couldn’t. It’s a position that I have. We always try to simplify things and it becomes clichéd and stigmatized. Why do we need to simplify things to be able to convey emotion? This is something that I’m trying to avoid. I think we have the right to complexity.”
