Category: the petri dish

New Pearl Jam

Lorraine Ali meets profile of Eddie Vedder and his bandmates for Newsweek:

After the success of their 1991 debut, “Ten,” which sold nearly 10 million copies, the Seattle group stopped making videos, shunned endorsements and shied away from almost all self-promotion. And each subsequent album proved less accessible than its predecessor. (Can you name the last two Pearl Jam records?)

Actually, no, I can’t, and I live with a card-carrying Ten Club member. But I am indeed looking forward to the new CD. I hope it’s good.



Palestinian Cinema

The Guardian‘s Xan Brooks (What kind of a name is Xan? A cool name, that’s what) interviews several Palestinian filmmakers about their work, and their challenges.

Feted by the critics and public alike, Palestinian cinema remains a culture in exile, an industry without a home. “Let me tell you about the Palestinian film industry,” says actor-director Mohammed Bakri, who made the documentary Jenin, Jenin after the demolition of the refugee camp. “Very simply, we do not have one. We have some very talented film-makers, but that’s about it. We have no film schools and we have no studios. We have no infrastructure because we have no country.”

From the sound of it, they have no distribution network either. “There is one cinema in Ramallah, and nothing anywhere else,” Bakri says. “And this is probably the biggest problem. We are not reaching the people we are talking about. For me it’s very painful, because obviously I want my people to see my films.” The irony is clear: visitors to the Palestine film festival in London will have had greater access to Palestinian films than the vast majority of Palestinians.

And yet, Palestinians directors still manage to release films, somehow. Read the full article here.

Thanks to David for the link.



‘Out of Sight’

Another day, another case of foolish racial profiling. This time, it’s John Sinno, the director of Seattle’s Arab and Iranian Film Festival, who was stopped and questioned for nine hours in Vancouver because he had a box of DVDs in the trunk of his car.

“I felt like I was in a military zone,” Sinno says. “They followed me to the bathroom and stood right behind me when I was at the urinal. It was unbelievably harsh for having a small box of DVDs.” That the box included titles such as Fahrenheit 9/11 and The Hidden Wars of Desert Storm was the least of his problems, says Sinno, who was travelling with a white American colleague. The colleague was waved on his way, while Sinno was held for nine hours. “They asked me where I got the DVDs from, and when I told them they didn’t believe me,” he says. “It was pretty scary. I said to them, look, I’m being racially profiled. Let’s admit it and move on.” He hesitates. “I don’t know if it’s a good idea to talk about it. We live in touchy times.”

More at the Guardian.



Arab & Iranian Film Festival

The Seattle Arab and Iranian Film Festival opens this weekend. It will shows feature films and documentaries from and about Algeria, Egypt, Iran, Iraq, Lebanon, Morocco, Palestine, Syria, and Yemen, with co-productions from Canada, France, Mexico, and the U.S. Yousry Nasrallah’s film adaptation of Elias Khoury’s novel Gate of the Sun will be shown, as well as the critically acclaimed Moroccan film The Grand Voyage. Check out the rest of the schedule.