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Farha (2021)Farha (2021)

Farha (2021)

A brutal coming-of-age film set at the start of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict

Drama, History, War

best
THE VERY BEST

8.0

movie

Jordan, Sweden
Arabic, English, Hebrew
Challenging, Dark, Depressing
2021
Darin J. Sallam, Female director
Ali Soliman, Ashraf Barhom
92 min

Synopsis

rotten tomatoes
imdb
wikipedia
Palestine, 1948. After the withdrawal of the British occupiers, tensions rise between Arabs and Jews. Meanwhile, Farha, the smart daughter of the mayor of a small village, unaware of the coming tragedy, dreams of going to study in the big city.

Our Take

8.0
The Staff

Based on a true story, Darin J. Sallam’s controversial debut feature Farha is, at heart, a brutal coming-of-age film. Set in 1948, the film is about a girl who gets locked into her family’s storeroom at the start of the Nakba, the Palestinian Catastrophe. Sallam’s choice to limit most of the film’s perspective to that small storeroom is brilliant – in some ways, it echoes the surrounding discussion about the conflict. Most of what the world knows of Palestine is limited due to having to deal with censorship, lost records, and only hearing word-of-mouth stories from ancestors who just barely survived. But what we see is already too horrific to begin with. And what the film knows is the tragedy of losing your home – having to leave childhood, leave your dreams, and leave a vibrant and living culture in order to survive.

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