'Wajib' stars father and son Mohammed and Saleh Bakri, with Maria Zreik. Courtesy Diff
'Wajib' stars father and son Mohammed and Saleh Bakri, with Maria Zreik. Courtesy Diff
'Wajib' stars father and son Mohammed and Saleh Bakri, with Maria Zreik. Courtesy Diff
'Wajib' stars father and son Mohammed and Saleh Bakri, with Maria Zreik. Courtesy Diff

Diff 2017: Gallows humour fuels Christmas spirit in Nazareth-based comedy Wajib


Kaleem Aftab
  • English
  • Arabic

Annemarie Jacir's third film, Wajib, a wry buddy comedy set during the run up to Christmas in Nazareth, sees legendary Arab actors Mohammad and Saleh Bakri together in a film for the first time. The real-life father and son play a father and son on screen.

"I cast Saleh in his first Arab film, my debut Salt of This Sea, and we have worked together ever since," Jacir says. "I know him well and he is an artistic partner. Mohammad, on the other hand, I had never worked with – but he is a legend. It was a very exciting, and scary, prospect to put them together. I knew how hard it would be for them. But it was the best decision I could have ever made."

The younger Bakri plays Rome-based architect Shadi, who is returning to Nazareth after a period away for the wedding of his sister Amal. In keeping with Palestinian tradition, Shadi, alongside his divorced father, Abu Shadi, must hand-deliver the wedding invitations to their guests. As they drive around town, it becomes apparent that the father and son have a strained relationship and there are a lot of loose ends. Abu is also trying to convince Shadi that Nazareth is a great place and he should return “home”.

It was the tradition of hand-delivering wedding invites that was the genesis for the film, but it is a tradition that is rarely upheld, Jacir explains "Very few Palestinians practice it anymore. But for Palestinians in the north, it's still taken very seriously. The men in the family are supposed to hand-deliver all the wedding invitations, and I found this very interesting. And it's that persistence, the need to hold onto this tradition, that is somehow a way to insist on their identity as Palestinians."

Using Nazareth as a backdrop enabled Jacir to explore the tensions and difficulties faced by Palestinians living in Israel. "It's the biggest Palestinian town inside of historic Palestine, which today is known as Israel and it's fully Palestinian: there are no Israelis who live in Nazareth – it's not like Haifa, which is a mixed city," she says. "Nazareth is just Palestinians, and it's a violent, tense city with people living on top of each other. They are fighting for land and they're not allowed to build outwards at all. It's a ghetto."

_______________________

More from Diff 2017: 

Patrick Stewart on Star Trek and a possible X-Men return

Director Ruben Ostlund discusses Cannes-lauded movie The Square

As Oscars beckon, Q’orianka Kilcher shuns typecasting

Diff 2017: Film festival announces 140-film line-up

_______________________

She feels that this community are the forgotten people of the Palestinian story. “They are not just invisible to the Israelis, but they are invisible all over the world. These Palestinians are isolated. The ‘Palestine’ they talk about, it’s right there where they are standing.”

It is this type of misnomer and confusion that serves as fuel for the comedy that peppers the film. Jacir creates a wonderful mix of tension, poignancy and jokes, as they journey throughout the day. The humorous tone of the film was also inspired in part by her observations of Nazareth. “Nazareth is a tense city, but it’s also hilarious. There is that Palestinian humour that you find in any small community made up of minorities living in difficult conditions; they rely on humour more. It’s a dry, wry humour, not
slapstick comedy.”

Shooting the film at Christmas time was not only a chance for her to play with the perceptions of the city and people living there, but also an artistic challenge to herself. “I mostly only shoot in the summer and most Arab films don’t shoot in the winter,” she says. “So to shoot at Christmas not only made sense [for the story], but also I like the light in Nazareth then. And Nazareth is just like everywhere else in the world: it suffers from the commercialisation of Christmas. This also fits in with the loneliness of Abu Shadi; he will be alone at Christmas. His son won’t be with him and his daughter will be away on honeymoon.”

Maria Zreik – one of five Screen Arab Stars of Tomorrow announced at the Dubai International Film Festival – plays Amal. It was important for Jacir to make her presence strong in the film. "I wanted to have this figure who is not a cliché," she explains. "She's happy getting married and comfortable, she knows what she wants and the life she wants to live in Nazareth."

Wajib screens December 10 at 10.15pm at the Madinat Theatre

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Kolarov (56')

Conflict, drought, famine

Estimates of the number of deaths caused by the famine range from 400,000 to 1 million, according to a document prepared for the UK House of Lords in 2024.
It has been claimed that the policies of the Ethiopian government, which took control after deposing Emperor Haile Selassie in a military-led revolution in 1974, contributed to the scale of the famine.
Dr Miriam Bradley, senior lecturer in humanitarian studies at the University of Manchester, has argued that, by the early 1980s, “several government policies combined to cause, rather than prevent, a famine which lasted from 1983 to 1985. Mengistu’s government imposed Stalinist-model agricultural policies involving forced collectivisation and villagisation [relocation of communities into planned villages].
The West became aware of the catastrophe through a series of BBC News reports by journalist Michael Buerk in October 1984 describing a “biblical famine” and containing graphic images of thousands of people, including children, facing starvation.

Band Aid

Bob Geldof, singer with the Irish rock group The Boomtown Rats, formed Band Aid in response to the horrific images shown in the news broadcasts.
With Midge Ure of the band Ultravox, he wrote the hit charity single Do They Know it’s Christmas in December 1984, featuring a string of high-profile musicians.
Following the single’s success, the idea to stage a rock concert evolved.
Live Aid was a series of simultaneous concerts that took place at Wembley Stadium in London, John F Kennedy Stadium in Philadelphia, the US, and at various other venues across the world.
The combined event was broadcast to an estimated worldwide audience of 1.5 billion.

UAE currency: the story behind the money in your pockets
yallacompare profile

Date of launch: 2014

Founder: Jon Richards, founder and chief executive; Samer Chebab, co-founder and chief operating officer, and Jonathan Rawlings, co-founder and chief financial officer

Based: Media City, Dubai 

Sector: Financial services

Size: 120 employees

Investors: 2014: $500,000 in a seed round led by Mulverhill Associates; 2015: $3m in Series A funding led by STC Ventures (managed by Iris Capital), Wamda and Dubai Silicon Oasis Authority; 2019: $8m in Series B funding with the same investors as Series A along with Precinct Partners, Saned and Argo Ventures (the VC arm of multinational insurer Argo Group)

Haircare resolutions 2021

From Beirut and Amman to London and now Dubai, hairstylist George Massoud has seen the same mistakes made by customers all over the world. In the chair or at-home hair care, here are the resolutions he wishes his customers would make for the year ahead.

1. 'I will seek consultation from professionals'

You may know what you want, but are you sure it’s going to suit you? Haircare professionals can tell you what will work best with your skin tone, hair texture and lifestyle.

2. 'I will tell my hairdresser when I’m not happy'

Massoud says it’s better to offer constructive criticism to work on in the future. Your hairdresser will learn, and you may discover how to communicate exactly what you want more effectively the next time.

3. ‘I will treat my hair better out of the chair’

Damage control is a big part of most hairstylists’ work right now, but it can be avoided. Steer clear of over-colouring at home, try and pursue one hair brand at a time and never, ever use a straightener on still drying hair, pleads Massoud.

Jetour T1 specs

Engine: 2-litre turbocharged

Power: 254hp

Torque: 390Nm

Price: From Dh126,000

Available: Now

The specs

Engine: 2.0-litre four-cylinder turbo

Power: 268hp at 5,600rpm

Torque: 380Nm at 4,800rpm

Transmission: CVT auto

Fuel consumption: 9.5L/100km

On sale: now

Price: from Dh195,000 

TWISTERS

Director: Lee Isaac Chung

Starring: Glen Powell, Daisy Edgar-Jones, Anthony Ramos

Rating: 2.5/5

F1 The Movie

Starring: Brad Pitt, Damson Idris, Kerry Condon, Javier Bardem

Director: Joseph Kosinski

Rating: 4/5

PROFILE OF STARZPLAY

Date started: 2014

Founders: Maaz Sheikh, Danny Bates

Based: Dubai, UAE

Sector: Entertainment/Streaming Video On Demand

Number of employees: 125

Investors/Investment amount: $125 million. Major investors include Starz/Lionsgate, State Street, SEQ and Delta Partners

Company profile

Date started: 2015

Founder: John Tsioris and Ioanna Angelidaki

Based: Dubai

Sector: Online grocery delivery

Staff: 200

Funding: Undisclosed, but investors include the Jabbar Internet Group and Venture Friends

How much do leading UAE’s UK curriculum schools charge for Year 6?
  1. Nord Anglia International School (Dubai) – Dh85,032
  2. Kings School Al Barsha (Dubai) – Dh71,905
  3. Brighton College Abu Dhabi - Dh68,560
  4. Jumeirah English Speaking School (Dubai) – Dh59,728
  5. Gems Wellington International School – Dubai Branch – Dh58,488
  6. The British School Al Khubairat (Abu Dhabi) - Dh54,170
  7. Dubai English Speaking School – Dh51,269

*Annual tuition fees covering the 2024/2025 academic year

Remaining fixtures
  • August 29 – UAE v Saudi Arabia, Hazza bin Zayed Stadium, Al Ain
  • September 5 – Iraq v UAE, Amman, Jordan (venue TBC)
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From Zero

Artist: Linkin Park

Label: Warner Records

Number of tracks: 11

Rating: 4/5

Director: Laxman Utekar

Cast: Vicky Kaushal, Akshaye Khanna, Diana Penty, Vineet Kumar Singh, Rashmika Mandanna

Rating: 1/5

The Uefa Awards winners

Uefa Men's Player of the Year: Virgil van Dijk (Liverpool)

Uefa Women's Player of the Year: Lucy Bronze (Lyon)

Best players of the 2018/19 Uefa Champions League

Goalkeeper: Alisson (Liverpool)

Defender: Virgil van Dijk (Liverpool)

Midfielder: Frenkie de Jong (Ajax)

Forward: Lionel Messi (Barcelona)

Uefa President's Award: Eric Cantona

UPI facts

More than 2.2 million Indian tourists arrived in UAE in 2023
More than 3.5 million Indians reside in UAE
Indian tourists can make purchases in UAE using rupee accounts in India through QR-code-based UPI real-time payment systems
Indian residents in UAE can use their non-resident NRO and NRE accounts held in Indian banks linked to a UAE mobile number for UPI transactions