By Amit Epstein | 12/08/2010
A friend of mine, who has moved to Berlin the same time I did more or less, became an appreciated figure in the European documentary film and art scene. We hardly see us due to her excessive load of work planning, organizing and creating.
Photo: amit Epstein
She is dedicated to her doings and contributes by creating appropriate platforms for others to voice their quandaries.On one hand she is a sweet and delicate young woman, but on the other a fierce and devoted person who stands for quality and clear views.
Needless to say, she is very involved in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and as a curator she has organized a few opportunities to address it via film and art; creating discussions, moving people's minds and exploring ideas for a progress – no wonder she has required a reputation. Due to that and as she holds a German passport, she has integrated very well. Recently she was even invited to be a part of the jury in an exclusive experimental documentary film festival in France, an honor which she gladly accepted. It was no easy job – those of us who had the chance to watch experimental films know that some of them may add up to a few stains which hardly move on the vibrating screen during an hour or more. In other words, it could be a real torture to watch five to seven hours a day for almost a week, being someone who's expected to watch it all, get it all, analyze and reward it. But she did it, she did it well and she even found a way to keep positive about it. She kept her enthusiastic high throughout the festival and was very happy to see a film created by a Syrian/ Lebanese film maker whom she knows and presented a while ago. He has made a film which has a narrative – kind of a no-go in the experimental scene – old fashion in the sense of having an idea. He documented the life of someone who became a friend but was first an Arabic intellectual, a world renowned researcher of the Islam, who stood up for open minded approach inside and towards outside of the Arabic society and eventually even had to leave the area because of threats. Not only she was personally touched by this brave man and the way he was captured in the film, she was impressed by both the form and the theme of the film and decided that's her winner. Within the jury she was the only one who thought so. After long conversations and debates she has somehow convinced even the ones who formalistically couldn't bare it that the film is indeed worthy, but not of the first prize. The second prize was a great "compromise", and she felt proud that she has managed to reward and serve a film that stands for pluralism and progressive ideas within the Arabic/ Muslim society. As it was her combat and in a way a victory she has initiated, the jury decided that she will be the representative who will read out the jury's decision and feedback and will call the film maker to the stage to grant him the prize. She has met him at the festival, before the jury has met, and talked about the film with him, as she was trying to hear more of his approach, his thoughts. He said he was mostly influenced by a documentary film once made of Prof. Leibovitz.
Anyway, to come to the point: at the evening of the big event (I said it was in France, didn't I? we all know how they like their ceremonies - comme il faut).
She was standing on the stage well dressed and excited in front of about 1000 viewers, behind her the jury, reading out the jury's choice and reasoning, calling his name to welcome him to the stage. As he slowly approached the podium she understood something is wrong, she wasn't sure what, but she told me that somehow she knew he's not going to thank her, he's not going to kiss or even shake her hand…he ignored her completely, he took the prize, mumbled a few words and got off the stage, to the amazement of everyone.
Afterwards, as the festival's director (half drunk at that point) shouted at him at the party that this is no way to behave he said something about how it would look if he had accepted and acknowledged a jury controlled by an Israeli, and that the situation now is so and so and therefore and therefore - so much for pluralism, so much for progressiveness.
Oscar Wild once said that "most people are other people. Their thoughts are someone else's opinions, their lives a mimicry, their passion a quotation".
How sad is it, when even people who stay so near to such a good idea, seem to forget it and do as others do, in the name of a second hand passion.
