Feature film
شيء ما يحترق
Ghassan Shmeit · 1993
Synopsis
Something Burns: Abu Ramzi has had to leave the Golan with his family during the war of 1967. From 1967 to 1986, the family lives in a provisional state that drags on, refusing to adapt to its new condition. The father never stops dreaming of return, while his son seeks to get rich by illicit means, far from the values of his own people. Between the two, the film measures what separates the generation of the fathers from that of the sons.
Context
The first feature film by its author, produced in Damascus by the public body from a screenplay co-written with the writer Walid Mimari, it runs one hundred and two minutes and brings together Mona Wassef, Khaled Taja, Youssef Hanna, Bassam Kousa, Ali Karim and Amal Arafa. The director draws in it on the exodus of his own family. Critics praised its compositions of light and colour while faulting its slow pace. The film has been shown again at events devoted to the Golan, in the province of Suwayda.
Who it is for
A feature film in Arabic, never released in France, at a slow pace; it assumes knowledge of the exodus of the inhabitants of the Golan in 1967.
Prizes and reception
Regarded as the first Syrian film devoted to the displaced people of the Golan after the defeat of June 1967.