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.
Elia SuleimanWhat cinema can do is the reordering of this reality from a certain chaos or from a certain order into an aesthetic dimension.
Elia SuleimanI am more at peace than I've ever known myself to be. My connectedness to the world is more intense. I am more attentive to the humanity around me.
Elia SuleimanPalestine is about how we drink the water, whether we are being ecological or not. Palestine is our way of exercising our daily living. That's what's going to solve the problem of Palestine. It's also how we think of ourselves spiritually. This kind of disconnectedness is harmful to the person who is acting that way and is sometimes annoying.
Elia SuleimanTo think that we are disconnected in some way serves the occupation whether it's through indifference or a distancing. It is a colonial approach of making you a subject and them the spectators. That is disturbing and counterproductive. And then suddenly they are surprised or find it alienating that the microcosmic effects of Palestine are happening in the U.S., France, and England, whether it's from the Islamic movements or immigration factors. Keeping a false purity of their countries will harm them eventually.
Elia SuleimanI don't particularly have a good memory. I think history is many times just the text written by the victors. I wanted to counter that aspect.
Elia SuleimanI think that whatever we express in terms of the potential truth is above all else about mobilizing ourselves for ourselves. We learn about ourselves as individuals. Identification with Palestine is universal and not restricted to geographic boundaries. It's a question of moral and ethical positions vis-ร -vis all the injustices that surround us.
Elia Suleiman