Dubai
With the tourism industry dwindling and financial markets falling, the luxury oasis of Dubai appears ever more implausible. The city is thus hedging its bets on other industries. Dubai aims to become a film production powerhouse in the Middle East, as evidenced by its annual film festival's emphasis on bringing together the best of Arab and Asian cinema.
To satisfy the city's thirst for glitz, the festival brought in Hollywood luminaries such as Nicolas Cage, Oliver Stone, Goldie Hawn, Brendan Fraser and Salma Hayek to grace the red carpet.
There was also a good deal of substance. The festival honoured three filmmaking greats with lifetime achievement awards: Terry Gilliam, who began his career assembling the animation for Monty Python's Flying Circus and went on to create quirky classics such as Brazil and 12 Monkeys; regional hero Rachid Bouchareb, the French-Algerian auteur responsible for soul-searching films such as Little Senegal and Days of Glory, for his contributions to Arab cinema; and Hong Kong's own Tsui Hark, who garnered the most attention with his pedigree as one of the founders of modern martial arts films.
'When I started out, I wanted to do something different, to make a connection with the youth of Hong Kong and the future of Hong Kong filmmaking. I hope I've succeeded,' he says.
Tsui, who screened Shanghai Blues (1985) and The Blade (1995) at the Dubai film festival, thinks the industry is on the brink of a great and welcome change. '[High-definition] cameras are changing cinema, and we're seeing a lot of that here. This new breed of directors is talented and many have a great eye, and they're not constrained by schedules, crews and budgets. It's great for film.'
Inside the theatre, Tsui's words rang true in films such as the excellent Survival Song (Xiao Li Zi). Produced and directed by Yu Guangyi, the documentary captures the struggle of Chinese peasants and their resilient fight to live off the land in Heilongjiang province in northeast China.
Struggle was a common theme in many of the films from the mainland, including River People, a documentary that chronicles the life of a family determined to fish the dwindling, brown currents of the Yangtze River. 'We set out not to make a statement,' says the film's producer Bing Shangdong, 'but to capture a disappearing way of life, and a very special family in rural China.'
Though crowds were sparse for many of the Chinese screenings, the sheer power of Yu's Survival Song resonated with the jury and the independent director walked away with the special jury prize for his modest masterpiece.
Another young mainland director, Shu Haolun, was awarded the Muhr Asia Africa shorts prize for his quirky tale of Shanghai lust, Young Blood (Shao Nian Xue).
Another standout in the Asian field was Dada's Dance, by Zhang Yuan. Newcomer Li Xinyun lights up the screen with her subtle but seductive performance as Dada, a girl searching for her own identity against the gritty backdrop of blue-collar mainland life.
This year in Dubai, North African films also found themselves in the spotlight, winning several awards. The film that garnered the biggest buzz (along with Danny Boyle's Slumdog Millionaire) was Casanegra, an uncompromising account of hustlers on the streets of Casablanca. Its two stars, Anas Elbaz and Omar Lofti, shared the award for best actor, and the film also won the best cinematography prize.
Taking the top prize at the awards ceremony, held in a massive sandstone amphitheatre in the Arabian Desert, was the Algerian/French co-production Masquerades. The film, about a man's struggle to earn respect in his Algerian village, touched a nerve with locals and foreigners alike. Annemarie Jacir's Palestine-set Salt of this Sea won the Muhr Award for best screenplay.
Big-budget Hollywood films were also screened at this year's festival, including Stone's W, and Steven Soderbergh's four-hour epic, Che. But this year they fizzled amid a field of ambitious, independent cinema that showcased some of the best talent in the region.
It was announced at the festival that work would soon commence on the United Arab Emirates' first government-funded, homegrown production: Ali Mostafa's City of Life.
At this fifth edition of Dubai's cinema showcase, it seemed as if this oasis of prosperity, which has done so much to showcase Arab cinema, is now poised to make important contributions of its own.
