In Frame
At Onassis airاليد الخضراء
FORAGERS + FROM SAFAD TO ATHINA FOOD WORKSHOP
2022
|Documentary
|64’
by Jumana Manna
Synopsis
Foragers depicts the dramas around the practice of foraging for wild edible plants in Palestine/Israel with wry humor and a meditative pace. Shot in the Golan Heights, the Galilee and Jerusalem, it employs fiction, documentary and archival footage to portray the impact of Israeli nature protection laws on these customs.
The restrictions prohibit the collection of the artichoke-like ’akkoub and za’atar (thyme) and have resulted in fines and trials for hundreds caught collecting these native plants. For Palestinians, these laws constitute an ecological veil for legislation that further alienates them from their land while Israeli state representatives insist on their scientific expertise and duty to protect. Following the plants from the wild to the kitchen, from the chases between the foragers and the nature patrol, to courtroom defenses, Foragers captures the joy and knowledge embodied in these traditions alongside their resilience to the prohibitive law. By reframing the terms and constraints of preservation, the film raises questions around the politics of extinction, namely who determines what is made extinct and what gets to live on.
Foragers received the Harrell Award at the Camden International Film Festival in 2022 and the Green Dox at Dokufest IDSFF 2022.
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The screening will be followed by the From Safad to Athens workshop led by Leila Jallad and food journalist Anastasia Miari. A workshop of food-tasting and storytelling, Leila and Anastasia will take participants on a personal journey that traces flavors and memories of life from Safad to Athens.
Official Poster
THE DIRECTOR
Jumana Manna is a visual artist and filmmaker. Her work explores how power is articulated, focusing on the body, land and materiality in relation to colonial inheritances and histories of place.
Through sculpture, filmmaking, and occasional writing, Manna deals with the paradoxes of preservation practices, particularly within the fields of architecture, agriculture and law. Her practice considers the tension between the modernist traditions of categorisation and conservation and the unruliness of ruination, life and its regeneration.
She has participated in multiple film festivals including the Berlinale, Viennale, BAFICI, IFFR, Cairo Cinema Days, Goteborg Film Festival, Ambulante, Cinéma du Réel, and Art of the Real. Her Wild Relatives (2018) won CPH:DOX’s New Visions Award, Sheffield Doc’s Environmental Film Award, DokuFest Kosovo’s Green Dox Award, and Palestine Cinema Days’ Sunbird Award.
Jumana was raised in Jerusalem and lives in Berlin.
Director's photo
Review
Between fiction and documentary, through archival footage and testimonies, Foragers tells the story of the tradition of harvesting two key herbs in Palestinian cuisine in the regions of Galilee, the Golan Heights and Jerusalem. This tradition is at odds with the Israeli environmental law, which prohibits "Arab" citizens from collecting Za'atar and 'Akkub under the pretext of protecting nature. With humor and a love of knowledge, filmmaker Jumana Manna asks questions about the politics of erasure: Who has the right to harvest? Why is a herb like Za'atar so important that it becomes a symbol of national pride for Palestinians and Israelis alike? As the Arabic title of the film suggests, the Green Hand [اليد الخضراء, Al-Yad Al-Khadra] is the hand of elderly Palestinians trying to preserve a generational tradition by resisting laws prohibiting access to land. This practice is inextricably linked to the concept of "Sumud" [صمود] which is a unique word for the resilience and steadfastness which Palestinians have developed in response to their oppression by Israeli imperialist expansionist politics. Starting from people’s personal stories, the filmmaker waters the audience's thinking around multifaceted ethical issues.
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Rabab El Mouadden
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The texts have been produced by the network Filmmakers for Palestine gr.
*We consider Filmmakers to be every person who designs, implements, analyzes and teaches cinema: from editors to assistant directors, from lighting technicians to film critics, from viewers to programmers. A film is created by every gaze that shapes it.
Editing & Translation Team: Sofia Grigoriadou, Christina Phoebe, Maximillien Luc Proctor, Sophia Thomopoulos
Director's photo
