Trip Along Exodus Trailer from Hind Shoufani on Vimeo.
TRIP ALONG EXODUS
Dir. Hind Shoufani / 2015 / 120 min
Trip Along Exodus is a feature-length documentary exploring the last 70 years of Palestinian politics seen through the prism of the life of Dr Elias Shoufani, a leader of the Palestinian Liberation Organization, an academic writer and leftist intellectual who worked with Fateh (but was one of the leaders of the opposition to Arafat) for 20 years. He is also the father of the filmmaker and writer, Hind.
"I had very little idea what occupied my mysterious father so intensely while we grew up in between Beirut, Damascus and Amman. We had bodyguards, drivers, metal bars around the balcony. Hushed whispers of political maneuverings were abundant instead of a normal social and familial community. An absent father whom we were told was a “Writer” should anyone ask. And people did slyly ask. And I had only vague answers.
Two decades later, the details of how my father abandoned his life in academia in Ivy League Universities in the US to join the Palestinian revolution in the 1970s surfaced, and with it, the story of how he created a fierce opposition to the mainstream policies of settlement that Arafat adopted. What had happened to that hopeful spirited revolution? A search for answers to his story evolved, a quest to understand this choice, to explain - and perhaps forgive- the hardships that this decision put his entire family through.
The film recreates Palestinian history using archive, family photos/8mm films, macro footage, glitter, interviews and multi media formats in a video-art style documentary, which serves overall as visual poems in a book.
It starts in 1948 and ends in current day war-torn Syria, where we once lived peacefully, unaware of what lies ahead.
The trip for information to solve the puzzle of what my father did in his life took five years, a lot of hard work hunting archive and filming in seven different cities. I located old friends and family who had been cut off, established a new relationship with my difficult father, and finally came to an understanding of where I come from, and what it is I am meant to be doing in this world."
For more information, check out the blog tripalongexodus.com
"I had very little idea what occupied my mysterious father so intensely while we grew up in between Beirut, Damascus and Amman. We had bodyguards, drivers, metal bars around the balcony. Hushed whispers of political maneuverings were abundant instead of a normal social and familial community. An absent father whom we were told was a “Writer” should anyone ask. And people did slyly ask. And I had only vague answers.
Two decades later, the details of how my father abandoned his life in academia in Ivy League Universities in the US to join the Palestinian revolution in the 1970s surfaced, and with it, the story of how he created a fierce opposition to the mainstream policies of settlement that Arafat adopted. What had happened to that hopeful spirited revolution? A search for answers to his story evolved, a quest to understand this choice, to explain - and perhaps forgive- the hardships that this decision put his entire family through.
The film recreates Palestinian history using archive, family photos/8mm films, macro footage, glitter, interviews and multi media formats in a video-art style documentary, which serves overall as visual poems in a book.
It starts in 1948 and ends in current day war-torn Syria, where we once lived peacefully, unaware of what lies ahead.
The trip for information to solve the puzzle of what my father did in his life took five years, a lot of hard work hunting archive and filming in seven different cities. I located old friends and family who had been cut off, established a new relationship with my difficult father, and finally came to an understanding of where I come from, and what it is I am meant to be doing in this world."
For more information, check out the blog tripalongexodus.com