Annemarie Jacir’s sweeping historical epic recounts the 1936-1939 Arab revolt against British control in Palestine just as Jewish immigrants start sailing in, germinating seeds of a partition that haunts the land to this day.
A myriad of intersectional characters and complex history lessons don’t bog down this ambitious and timely period piece. Aided by some gloriously colored archival footage and multi-layered characters rooted in history, Palestine 36 is an urgent history lesson for both sympathizers of Palestinian solidarity and apolitical cinephiles. Dabbling with a narrative that can easily power ten one-hour episodes of a miniseries, Palestinian director-writer Annemarie Jacir expertly balances parallel stories to make her narrative as diverse as possible. The Jewish immigrants, believing in a promised land, might not get much screentime as the period is such that the Palestinians were busier in armed resistance against their British overlords. But the scars of the then-nascent ‘Zionism’ and the British haste in arriving at a thinly penciled border solution are felt with searing emotion by the film’s several wronged protagonists across the land.
Stirring portrayals of the Palestinian populace across cultures and generations. Jacir ensures that her homeland isn’t just presented as a homogeneous desert of suffering and massacre, as her three-cinematographer crew (Hélène Louvart, Sarah Blum, Tim Fleming) capture panoramic views of the green olive groves and cotton fields spread around the Palestinian countryside. The Palestinian villagers include farmers, family elders (Succession’s Hiam Abbas in a terrific bit role), Christian priests, Muslim clerics, all representing a collective fear of their colonial overlords and the newly arrived European guests widening their fences on their land. Meanwhile, in the heart of urban centers like Jerusalem, debates persist between liberal feminist journalist Khuloud (Yasmine al Massri) and her ultra-rich news baron lover, Amir (Dhafer L’Abidine). While Khuloud passionately supports the Arab-lead rebellion for a free Palestine, Amir is convinced he’s supporting Arab business through his entrepreneurship, even if it comes at the cost of partnering with colonial and Zionist tendencies. Torn between the village and the city is Khalid (Salid Bakri), a dreamy-eyed youngster who is tempted by the big city charm of making money but is drawn back to his olive farm roots as his homeland crumbles in front of him.
An epic that balances verbose debates with sprawling action sets, while holding steadfast to its call to action. And to round out the ensemble are the British players, led by veteran thespian Jeremy Irons as Arthur Wauchope, the frail and aging High Commissioner for Palestine, whose middle-ground approach brings more harm than peace to the region. Scotsman Richard Aramayo sheds his usual niceness (as seen in recent comedy-drama I Swear). He turns into a textbook khaki-wearing villain, the sadistic Captain Wingate, who strongly believes in Palestine being the rightful homeland of Zionist settlers. There’s no moral greyness in the script, and the demarcations between the broken, displaced heroes and the house-burning, house-invading villains are more than obvious. Even the Gandhian-seeming figures like Irons’ Wauchope are only enabling more encroachments and massacres by looking away from the chaos. That is perhaps an approach that anti-war films from the US and the UK can afford, such as Alex Garland’s otherwise technically brilliant hits, like Civil War and Warfare. Alas, the ‘humanity is the real enemy’ and ‘both sides are the same’ discourse can’t save the day in a country that has almost always struggled to be recognised as a country.
More than just a history lesson. Palestine 36 brilliantly captures the nearly century-old premise’s urgency and relevance through not just archival history but also engaging action. While the worst is inflicted on them and their homes, the Palestinians in Jacir’s film aren’t reduced to hapless victims either. Whether they’re rallying and making speeches or hurling stones and picking up guns, the rebels aren’t just the armed horse riders but also every child and parent who put their faith in a broken system. It’s easy for critics to shoebox this period piece as Palestine’s answer to desert epics like Lawrence of Arabia or even Exodus (if we look for an example closer home). But by giving all its varied populations agency through words and even the muted silences, Jacir’s film hauntingly reminds its global audience to listen to the ghosts of the land and avoid the mistakes of the past. Palestine 36 doesn’t shy away from its call for political rebellion, but it hardly ever panders to sensationalist propaganda or provocatively graphic violence. The good and bad characters might be easy to spot with the old-school battles on horseback, but Jacir’s lens never shies away from the emotion. The tears feel real even if they’re not hyper-fetishised with rousing music or intense close-ups. In fact, the tears flow with both hopelessness and hope. And that’s what makes Palestine 36 more than just a fact-based history lesson.
Ambitious Palestinian period piece is heavy on historical facts, old-school action, timely messages, but most importantly narratives by humans, not tropes.
