The first Toronto Palestine Film Festival was held last week, showcasing 37 films as Palestinians commemorate the 60th anniversary of the Nakba. The event featured the theatrical release of Annemarie Jacir’s film Salt of This Sea, starring Suheir Hammad, a Palestinian-American poet, as a Palestinian woman who leaves Brooklyn and travels to her homeland in an attempt to claim her grandfather’s life savings. In a press conference held on the festival’s opening day, Hammad spoke with The Varsity about making her big screen debut.
The Varsity: Why do you think Toronto was chosen as the venue for the film’s release?
Suheir Hammad: I come from the States, and sometimes when you say the word “Palestine,” you have to defend yourself. I am really glad to be in a major city where people understand the story that we ourselves as Palestinians live in so many ways […] and where people who are or are not Palestinian can listen to our accent and look at our hair and see our stories for their weaknesses and their strengths.
TV: Traditionally, Palestinian women have been denied a major role in the country’s film industry. How is this film changing that?
SH: This is the first feature film that has been written and directed by a Palestinian woman, Annemarie Jacir, and in that regard it is worthy of people’s attention because it takes a lot for a woman writer and director to get a feature off the ground.
TV: Were there difficulties making this film in the West Bank and Israel?
SH: We applied for a permit for our entire West Bank crew to travel to the 1948 Israel with us and they were all denied. We were sponsored by the French and North American embassy but every single one of our crew members was denied entry in spite of Israel. So we had to hire a crew in Israel. Annemarie and all of us agreed that we wanted a full Palestinian crew because there are so many Palestinian artists and technicians. We really wanted to make that happen, but when we got there we realized that there was no way. We needed a truck driver, someone with an Israeli license, and the guy [we hired] was not even Jewish—he was a Russian Christian who came to Israel.
TV: The Israeli government forced your crew into shooting certain scenes in France. Can you describe the current conditions of the film industry in Palestine?
SH: It seems that anyone who wants to work in film in Palestine has to leave. Anyone who wants to work in Palestine has to leave, but especially in film, it is very sad how people want to make art there but have to leave. Annemarie has been denied entry into Israel-Palestine since the making of our film, and we actually had a part of the film which was ruined and it was a scene which had to be reshot. She was not allowed re-entry, so we shot that scene in the south of France. Since last June, Annemarie has not been allowed back in. She now lives in Jordan.
TV: You recently launched your fourth book of poetry. Do you plan to pursue an acting career following this project?
SH: I’m a poet, not an actor. It was poetry that allowed me to do this film. I did not have formal training, and the scenes where I really acted are not in the film.
