Leila Sansour’s documentary about her campaign to open up Jesus’s birthplace once again is admirable – even if you don’t rate its chances too highly
Palestinian director Leila Sansour has made a fierce, poignant film about her family and her hometown of Bethlehem, now in Palestinian territory but progressively stifled by the Israeli government’s anti-terrorist barrier; that huge, ugly wall with which Benjamin Netanyahu apparently wishes to be remembered as the Erich Honecker of the Middle East. At the moment, tourists can only visit Bethlehem for brief periods by means of an intensely policed system of state-approved minibuses. This film shows how Sansour comes to Bethlehem with her husband, novelist Nicholas Blincoe, with a bold, imaginative plan in mind: her Open Bethlehem campaign. It’s an attempt to marshal a rainbow coalition of prominent international Christians, Muslims and Jews to persuade Israel’s government to open up...
Palestinian director Leila Sansour has made a fierce, poignant film about her family and her hometown of Bethlehem, now in Palestinian territory but progressively stifled by the Israeli government’s anti-terrorist barrier; that huge, ugly wall with which Benjamin Netanyahu apparently wishes to be remembered as the Erich Honecker of the Middle East. At the moment, tourists can only visit Bethlehem for brief periods by means of an intensely policed system of state-approved minibuses. This film shows how Sansour comes to Bethlehem with her husband, novelist Nicholas Blincoe, with a bold, imaginative plan in mind: her Open Bethlehem campaign. It’s an attempt to marshal a rainbow coalition of prominent international Christians, Muslims and Jews to persuade Israel’s government to open up...
- 12/4/2014
- by Peter Bradshaw
- The Guardian - Film News
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