A slogan on the Chinese poster is very eye-catching:
I want to sue my parents because they gave birth to me. --Zane
Lebanese female director Labaki presented this story of a Syrian refugee in a slum in Lebanon with her unique perspective and method:
The actor Zane, whose age is unknown, is said to be about 12 years old. He lives illegally in a slum in Lebanon with his parents and siblings in order to escape the war in Syria. A large family was crowded in a very small house, and when they slept, they all slept on the ground. Instead of letting him go to school, his father let him go to work in a small shop. Every day, he goes to a small store to organize merchandise, deliver goods, and sometimes go to the street with his sister Saha to sell juice to make a living.
When his most concerned sister Saha had menarche, Zane not only helped her to wash her pants and steal sanitary napkins, but also repeatedly told her to hide the sanitary napkins, otherwise she might be "married" if her parents saw her. NS.
Unfortunately, the parents finally decided to marry the younger sister, who was less than 12 years old, to the landlord Assad in order to offset the increased rent. He desperately resisted and tried to rescue his sister, but he was still young and weak, and in the end he could only watch his sister be taken away.
Angrily, he ran away from home and met Lahir, an unidentified black female Ethiopian worker. This woman who had no legal status and was also struggling to take in Zane allowed him to spend a short period of peaceful time without having to run for a living. But the good times did not last long. Rahir was detained by the police when he went out to raise money and never returned home.
Fate once again pushed Zane to the bottom of despair. In order to take care of Rashiel's young son, Jonas, he tried every means, including selling tramadol pills as a drug substitute-tramadol drink. But in the end, because he was driven out by the landlord, he couldn't get the money back, and had no choice but to sell Jonas.
When he returned home, he was shocked by the news of his sister Saha's death. He rushed to the landlord Assad's house with a knife, cut him and was sentenced for it. In prison, he called the TV station and said that he was going to sue his parents, because at this moment, he had just lost Saha's parents and became pregnant again. He also called this a "gift from Allah."
In court, he said:
I hope that adults will listen to me. I only remember violence, insults or beatings, chains, pipes, belts, the softest words I have ever heard are "Go, son of a bitch", "Go, you rubbish". Life is a pile of shit, no more valuable than my shoes. I live in hell here, I am like a pile of rotten meat. Life is a bitch. I think we can be good people and be loved by everyone, but God doesn't want us to be like this. He wants us to be trampled underfoot like a carpet. --Zane
After watching the movie, I watched an English interview about the creative process of director Labaki, roughly translated and edited as follows:
Regarding creative motivation, Labaki said that one night when she drove home and was waiting for a red light, she saw a woman and a 1-year-old child sitting on a buffer in the middle of the road. As soon as the child takes a nap, he will be awakened by the sound of passing cars. The child can only survive in the middle of the two highways. If he tried to leave, he might be killed by a fast-moving vehicle. This situation touched her.
When she started to prepare for the movie, she found that many children were very negative, not crying, smiling, or playing. Even if they put the toy in front of them, they won't touch it. There was no childhood brilliance in their eyes, so she asked them, "Are you happy?"
99% of the children answered "No", they said, "I am not happy here", "Why no one in this world takes care of me", "Why should I endure hunger all the time", they feel that they came to the world because They were punished.
Instead of looking for professional actors, Labaki recruited people with similar experiences to the story she envisioned to perform. Because she doesn't want this to be a "acted" movie, these tragedies are not only stories on the screen, but also facts that happen every day. Therefore, this is not a "regular" movie with "plans, budgets, shooting locations," etc. When filming, she will not give specific lines, but tell the "actors" of the situation, let them play freely, the photographer is only responsible for recording.
In the end, they shot 500 hours of material in six months and took a year and a half to edit. The first version lasted 12 hours and was finally cut into the 126-minute version of Cannes.
Regarding the meaning of movies, Labaki said, “I don’t want to naively say that movies can change the world, but if it can change your attitude towards these children, or your attitude towards your own life, then it can at least change it to a certain extent. You. Real change will only begin to happen when thousands of people can look at these issues from different perspectives."
Mousanar, one of Labaki’s screenwriters, said, “Even if you know you can’t change anything, you can still dream of what you can do. Human progress depends on dreams, not cynicism.”
Regarding Zane’s "court prosecution", it is actually impossible to take place in Lebanon, because the law does not allow children to sue their guardians. But in order to express the need, Labaki still set the plot like this, because she thinks this is the only way to make the child make a sound and resonate. She said, "I hope that the child can directly face the entire social system to express anger, and the only way to achieve this goal is through the court, through his own oral statement."
In the end, Zane in the movie laughed because he could get a proof of identity with his name printed on it. Although this does not mean that all worries will disappear, Labaki said, "This is a little light of victory given to you at the end of the tunnel. It is this light that allows you to move on."
For many people who don't know the Middle East, perhaps the scenes of the movie itself are shocking and surprising. But to me, those are all too familiar: chaotic bazaars, exploded families, little girls selling napkins, cramped homes where everyone sleeps together, disorderly streets... this is the piece The reality that is happening and acting on the earth every day.
At the beginning of the film, accompanied by music, a group of children laughed, smoked, played with guns... that was one of Zane's few laughs in the entire movie. Most of the time, he is taking on responsibilities that should be borne by adults. Every day I wake up, it is a new rush, a hopeless fight for survival.
The most distressing thing about Zane, a child, is that he is too clear and sees too clearly, his eyes are mature and full of anxiety, without the innocence and innocence of a child. Because of his young age, he is well versed in the rules of social operation.
He knew that the landlord and his employer, Assad, gave his sister snacks for nothing, so he threw the bag of things into the trash as soon as he went out;
He knew that a girl's trousers were bloody because of menstruation. He knew that a girl who had menstruation might be sold by her parents to get married. So while washing her pants and stealing sanitary napkins for her sister, he tried every means to teach her to conceal it;
He knew that Assad and his father came to the house together to propose marriage, so he tried his best to ask his mother to drive them away;
He knew that his sister was taken away to be "married", so he used his extremely weak body to resist, tore, yell, and chase, but because of the unequal strength, he could only watch his beloved sister being taken away;
He heard his father's leaked "hospital notice" and asked who had entered the hospital. When he learned that his beloved sister Saha had passed away, he took the kitchen knife and rushed out;
He knew that his mother's pregnancy again meant another tragedy was about to be born, so he called the TV station to tell his story, and even took his parents to court.
When he appeared in the court, he made a statement about knocking on the soul: I want to sue my parents because they gave birth to me.
Zane's reason and sobriety make it hard to believe that he is just a 12-13 year old boy. He is much kinder and more sober than the adults around him who are desperately making excuses for themselves and participating in the operation of this chaotic society. But he was the most painful.
Parents can make excuses for Sahana’s involuntary marriage, such as "find a good house for her and let her sleep in bed." But Zane knew that his sister was not only involuntarily married, but also a naked child marriage;
Assad can make excuses for marrying an 11-year-old girl, such as "other girls are also married at the age of 11 and live well", but Zane knows that the death of his sister is directly related to the behavior of this bad man. ；
The mother can think of being pregnant again as a "gift from Allah", but Zane knows that the birth of another child is just a repeat of his or his sister's fate.
He finally attributed the cause of these pains to the fault of his parents. It is the parents who are incapable of nurturing but have to keep giving birth, causing the tragedy of so many children.
The poorer, the poorer and the poorer. Parents who fail are expecting their children to change their destiny. In their eyes, boys are tools that can share the burden of life, and girls are commodities that can be sold for money. In the end, they personally destroyed the lives of so many children.
The most uncomfortable thing about this movie is that Zane's experience is not very special. The social problems he encountered are widespread in Syria, Iraq, Afghanistan and other countries, and countless people are living in the shadows. There are many social problems that are common in the Middle East mentioned in the film. Let me briefly elaborate:
1. Very high fertility rate and extremely high unemployment rate
There is one character that impressed me, that is Mason, the little girl selling tissues in the market. Walking on some streets in Syria, you will be really surprised, because some people brought a few small packages of napkins and sat on the sidewalk, even if they came out to "do business". On congested streets, children can often be seen knocking on the windows of private cars and taxis with a few packs of napkins.
In the 1980s of the last century, the Arab world ushered in a wave of birthrate explosions. It is commonplace for a family to have 5-10 children. I often ridicule them as "there is a football team in the family", and Syria is no exception.
From 1981 to 2000, the total population of the country soared from 9.05 million to 16.32 million, but the total GDP only increased by 11.8%. The level of social development and the jobs provided are far behind the surge in population. On the eve of the "Arab Spring", the unemployment rate across Syria was as high as 30%. It takes an average of four years for young people who have just entered the labor market to find their first job.
After the outbreak of the civil war, a large number of refugees poured into neighboring countries such as Jordan, Lebanon, and Turkey, which also caused a very large burden on the employment rate of these countries. Society simply cannot provide employment opportunities for so many people.
As a result, in the refugee areas of these countries, you will see a large number of young people who can't find a job and do nothing, or people who just take a few packs of napkins and chewing gum and sell them on the street.
2. Educational issues
At the beginning of the film, accompanied by music, a group of children are smoking cigarettes together. Such a scene may be surprising, but it is real. In the streets or squares of Syria, I often see minors smoking cigarettes stubbornly. And when I chatted with some local people, they didn't think there was any problem with "kid smoking".
Since there are many children in each family, parents have no time to pay much attention to their children's education. We have also seen from the film that Zane’s parents didn’t want him to go to school or become a better person, but hope that he will grow up quickly, help share the affairs of taking care of his younger siblings, and help him to work in the shop. Supplement the household. They give birth to children for "use", not for "giving love" and "cultivating."
3. Marriage issues
Saha’s way of getting married is still widespread in Muslim society. For example, in southern Iraq, free love is not allowed, and boys’ and girls’ schools are separated, and when they reach the age of marriage, parents are introduced by matchmakers to choose a partner for their children. In a relatively developed and open city like Baghdad, two young people will meet and talk in the presence of both parents and relatives to confirm whether each other agrees to the marriage. In the underdeveloped areas, young people have no choice at all. They can only obey the orders of their parents.
In relatively open Syria, there are already bold young men and women who dare to "secretly fall in love." In the old city of Damascus at night, I even saw a warm scene of a man and a woman sitting on the gloomy steps and chatting. But generally speaking, "free love" is still a taboo topic. Generally, young men and women who look at each other first have to report to their parents, then hold a marriage ceremony, and then start a "justified" love. From the date of marriage to marriage, they all live in their own parents' homes.
4. Child marriage and domestic violence
Many Middle Eastern countries do not set a minimum age for marriage. According to the Quran, Muhammad married a 9-year-old girl as his wife, so they believed that the girl could get married when she was 9 years old.
Today, the problem of child marriage is still widespread in many countries in the Middle East. Since the outbreak of the Syrian civil war, negative factors such as turbulence and poverty have greatly increased the rate of child marriage. Between 2011 and 2014, child marriage among Syrian refugees in Jordan rose from 12% to 32% of all registered marriages.
Equally serious is the problem of domestic violence. Since marriage is not a free choice, and there is no normal time to fall in love and get along before marriage, many men who tend to domestic violence will not be noticed at all. A girl I know who works for the Baghdad feminist organization told me that in Iraq alone, more than 20% of women suffer from domestic violence. The police usually think that domestic violence is a "domestic matter" and ignore the report.
In a very traditional Muslim society like Iraq, women have no way to live independently from their families, so they have no way to escape and report to the police. They can only endure a tragic fate in silence.
5. Refugee status
The outbreak of the Syrian civil war has led to an influx of people into neighboring countries such as Jordan, Lebanon, and Turkey. However, the UN refugee agency is unable to resettle so many refugees, so many refugees who cannot apply to go to Europe and other places through the formal process can only make a living by smuggling, without status, etc.
It is not easy to apply to become a refugee and then move to Europe. It needs to go through a complicated application process and approval process. Moreover, the status of "refugee" will be subject to many restrictions, such as finding a job and living area.
I have a Syrian friend in Lebanon who doesn't want to take the status of a refugee, but fortunately, her mother is Lebanese, so she can live in Lebanon temporarily during the war. But the Syrian passport made her face many setbacks when she was looking for a job. For example, for the same job, as a Syrian, she received a far lower salary than a Lebanese, and even the company would not give her because of nationality issues. She was completely qualified for the job. work.
As for smuggling, it is not only expensive, but it also bears the accidents that may be brought about by long-distance voyages. Generally speaking, they will first come to Lebanon or Turkey from Syria, then set off from the port here and take a smuggled ferry to Europe. Many people died in this long voyage. I have a friend from Syria. Her brother smuggled into Switzerland during the war. It is said that the cost of smuggling depends on many factors, such as the length of the voyage and the size of the ship.
But being able to have an identity or successfully smuggling is already considered lucky. As shown in the movie, many people who have fled their homeland have no legal status at all, without passports, and have been living in fear and fear with a black account.
Although this is a very heavy topic, I am still very happy that a director like Labaki can put these stories on the big screen, so that we, born in the peaceful era, can see what is happening on the other side of the world.
Recognizing the diversity of the world can change our understanding of life, society, and the world to a certain extent. I hope that when you talk to others about the Middle East, you can talk about something other than "always fighting", "so chaotic", and "horrible".
Finally, as said at the end of the movie, I hope every brave child can be treated kindly by the world.
I want to add one more sentence, I hope the bastard adults can be punished.
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