Divine Intervention
Director: Elia Suleiman,
Producer: Humbert Balsan,
Distributor: Seville Pictures
Winner of the Jury Prize and
the International Critics' Prize, Cannes, 2002

After having just moved from Nazareth to Vancouver, my husband and I recently saw Divine Intervention at the Vancouver International Film Festival. The film features the gloomy faced director, Elia Suleiman, as a character whose father is sick and whose girlfriend, Manal Khader, lives on the other side of an Israeli checkpoint. Hardly a word is spoken, but comic sketches depicting the psychological effect of life under constant pressure say it all; chaos and aggression are everywhere.

Suleiman presents his criticism of Israel by showing the effects that violence and suppression have on Palestinian society. The men of Nazareth have nothing to do (due to the paralyzed economy) and get on each other's nerves. Every Nazarene will recognize the man driving his car waving politely at all the people he knows while quietly cursing each of them. The viewer sees a society that has lost its compassion after having no other way to let out frustration than towards itself. This lack of control people feel over their lives manifests itself mostly in petty fights and misdirected cruelty.

Revenge fantasies also have a role in releasing tension. Suleiman and his lover are forced to meet next to a checkpoint (set up to restrict Palestinians in their movements) where they watch Palestinians being humiliated by border guards. Suleiman ridicules the power lusting soldiers by floating a balloon with Arafat's face printed on it across the checkpoint. The soldiers chaotically try to figure out if they should shoot it down because it undercuts their control. In another scene, Suleiman expresses his resistance by fantasizing about a single female Palestinian ninja killing Israeli commandos one by one.