“I'm not in the business of saying just one thing about just one place. If you only see Palestine in my films, then I've failed because then I'm just a provincial filmmaker.” IfsFilmOne ThingFilmmakerJust OnePalestine Author:Elia Suleiman
“Palestine is an extremely familiar place to me. Someone like me who lives everywhere in the world cannot be contained. If my hope and ambitions are in the right place, you can judge that in my films. I want to make films that diffuse any local notion. Cinema criss-crosses borders and check points. If the film is good, then it's universal.” IfsWorldWantFilmJudgingAmbitionCrossesUniversalNotionChecksLocalsFamiliarLike MeBordersCinemaPalestineRight PlaceFamiliar Places Author:Elia Suleiman
“A lot of narrative films leave you no space for anything else but eating popcorn. I want to go in the complete opposite direction. I have to evacuate all psychology, to be less a protagonist and more a presence.” WantFilmSpacePsychologyEatingOppositesNarrativeProtagonistsPopcornComplete Opposites Author:Elia Suleiman
“If a person just takes what is socio-political and geographical from the themes of my films then that's not enough. But if the person goes out of the theatre and, for example, makes the dinner he's eating later on, extra nice then I feel that I have succeeded. We have this urge to anaesthetize the moment we're living in.” IfsFeelsPersonsEnoughMomentsFilmPoliticalNiceExampleEatingDinnerTheatreExtrasThemeUrges Author:Elia Suleiman
“It's important for me to not historicize. I work to diffuse the issue of identity and to intensify identification. You have to lose your authority in the making of a film to achieve this. The film is about me being absolutely dislocated. I focus on the very personal to arrive at the very political.” ImportantFilmPoliticalLosesIssuesFocusAchieveIdentityAuthorityIdentification Author:Elia Suleiman
“The desire to express in an art form and to compose a tableau and vignette whether it's humorous, burlesque, or poetic comes simply from a desire to compose an image for cinema. It is not my fault that when I go to Ramallah there is a checkpoint and therefore it enters my film. Tell me a way to avoid that politicized image. The fact is that the police are everywhere, the army everywhere and occupation is total. Whether it's a love story or a thriller, you place the camera and these realities will cross the frame.” WayArtFactsStoriesRealityFilmFormDesireHumorousCrossesArmyPoliceCamerasFaultsLove StoryCinemaPoeticOccupationThrillersBurlesqueVignettesCheckpointsTableau Author:Elia Suleiman
“I do not teach history in my films. I don't have a linear point of view or argument. What I do in my films is to live the human experience; human, whether in Nazareth or anywhere else in the world.” WorldHumansFilmViewsTeachArgumentPoint Of ViewHuman ExperienceLinearNazareth Author:Elia Suleiman
“To think of a film from the point of view of a tank barrel is already so inhumanly positioned. This is when film can reveal itself scandalously.” ThinkingFilmViewsPoint Of ViewTanksBarrels Author:Elia Suleiman
