ReFocus: The Films of Jocelyne Saab: Films, Artworks and Cultural Events for the Arab World

by Mathilde Rouxel (Editor), Stefanie Van de Peer (Editor)

Overview

Jocelyne Saab was one of the most important female filmmakers pioneering a sense of international emancipatory world cinema from the early 1970s to her death in 2019. This book is the first English-language study dedicated to her entire oeuvre which consisted of journalism, documentaries, experimental and feature films, as well as photography, art exhibitions and curation, and film festival organisation.
In this book, a range of international scholars integrates her work into a cohesive study of all aspects of her oeuvre – filmic, activist and artistic – representing the global significance of Saab’s work and the ongoing resonance of her ideals and activism in a worldwide perspective.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781474480420
Publisher:	Edinburgh University Press
Publication date:	02/24/2023
Series:	ReFocus: The International Directors Series
Pages:	304
Product dimensions:	6.14(w) x 9.21(h) x (d)

About the Author

Dr Mathilde Rouxel is a researcher at the New Sorbonne University, and an independent curator, specialising in Arab cinema

Stefanie Van de Peer is Reader in Film & Media at Queen Margaret University

Table of Contents

AcknowledgementsList of ContributorsList of Images

Introduction: A Synthesis and Testimony of Jocelyne Saab’s Life and Work - Mathilde Rouxel and Stefanie Van de Peer

PART 1 - JOCELYNE SAAB: 50 YEARS OF CREATION IN THE TURMOIL OF ARAB HISTORY

1. Telling the Tale of a World in Turmoil: Conversations with Jocelyne Saab - Olivier Hadouchi

2. On Representing the War as Rupture: Jocelyne Saab and New Lebanese Cinema (1975-1990) - Ghada Sayegh

3. Jocelyne Saab's Hanging Gardens: A Multimedia Architecture through Stories and Time - Joan Grandjean

4. A Filmmaker’s Words: A Journey Through the Archive of Jocelyne Saab’s Unfinished Work - Mathilde Rouxel

PART 2 - FILM AS A WEAPON AGAINST WAR AND OBLIVION

5. From Class Struggle to Sectarian Warfare: Jocelyne Saab’s Beirut Trilogy - Giovanni Vimercati

6. Beirut, There Was and There Was Not - Mark Westmoreland

7. A Mother and Daughter Reunion: How Jocelyne Saab shot her last documentary My Name is Mei Shigenobu - Yomota Inuhiko

8. Jocelyne Saab and CRIFFL: Dismantling Boundaries and Making New Routes for Asian Cinema in Lebanon - Nemesis Srour

PART 3 - LIBERATING THE PEOPLE, FREEING THE BODY

9. Guerrillas, Border Crossings and Internationalism: The Liberation of Non-Arabs in Jocelyne Saab’s Early Documentaries - Stefanie Van de Peer

10. "Talking about Something much Larger": Script Development and Creating Metaphor and Meaning in Jocelyne Saab’s Dunia (2005) - Margaret McVeigh

11. The Feminist Cinema of Jocelyne Saab: Women’s Relationships and the Philosophy of Dance in Four Feature Fiction Films - Maram Soboh

12. Exile, Gender and Empowerment in Jocelyne Saab’s Films: Le Café du Genre and One Dollar a Day - Corinne Fortier

13. Twilight Reflections in Single Frames and Short Sequences - Samirah Alkassim

PART 4 - ADVOCATING POETRY

14. A Suspended Life: A Cinematic Fall - Marie Chebli

15. The City of Disasters and Dreams: Experiencing Beirut and its Urban Geography in light of Jocelyne Saab’s Beyrouth ma ville and Ghazl el Banat - Gregory Buchakjian

16. Fiction and Voyeurisms: For a Fantasmatic History - Léa Polverini

17. Catalogue of Jocelyne Saab’s Artistic Output - Mathilde Rouxel

Editorial Reviews

This impressive collection is of interest beyond film studies, it engages with poetry, photography, urban studies, Asian Studies and is itself a beautiful tribute to Saab’s life and work.

Studies in World Cinema - Claire Launchbury

This tantalizing compilation of a great variety of authors and perspectives, well-informed and original, rightly mirrors the multi-faceted and challenging oeuvre of Lebanese artist-filmmaker Jocelyne Saab and her truly global and internationalist stature.

filmmaker Viola Shafik