Farha

I'm not going to lie, this makes really difficult viewing. Anyone with an ounce of empathy and compassion will find it heartbreaking. But this also makes it essential viewing so that we understand the history and the pain of the Palestinian people. I had hoped to see it more from a historical aspect but seeing it from the view of Farha really helps you to get to grips with what it was like for Palestinians at the time. It isn't overly graphic but could be quite a traumatic watch for younger viewers. But what about the situation in Palestine isn't traumatic? I watched it with my 13, 11 and 6 yr old children.

As an advocate of the Palestinian cause for decades, I needed no convincing. I didn't need a documentary or history lesson. What I got was a compelling story of a family and the village they lived in during the time of the Nakba. It was all the more engaging for essentially being a true story passed down the generations by "Farha" herself.

It's rare that I sit watching the credits at the end of a film. I did so stunned and halfway through the flood of bitter tears came. Tears at the ruination of Farha's life and that of millions of others, tears at the way Palestine was dispossessed, tears at the destruction of a settled culture and traditions to make way for invaders.

I can't imagine how this tale could have been better acted, directed or told. I've visited the camps in Syria where Farha ended up and I know that Palestine is engraved on the hearts of everyone there. I long for the day that they can return.

Please watch this film.

The tale of Farha is not only a tale of the destruction of Palestinian life caused by the Nakba. It is a sensitive and beautiful portrait of traditional village life and the dreams of a young girl who desires an education beyond that provided to girls by the village Sheikh as well as a destiny beyond marriage. No one should miss this portrait of Palestine in 1948.

Although the film begins at a time of turmoil, the traditional harvest by the women of the village is shown while Farha reads a book. Her father, as mayor, is asked to join the fighters but hesitates. A traditional betrothal is shown, and the viewer becomes aware of Farha's indifference to a marriage arrangement and her own ambition to study at a school in the city. It is against this backdrop that the violence and destruction of the Nakba begins to unfold.

The inclusion of traditional harvest and betrothal songs are beautiful details and offer a counterpoint to the horror of the events of 1948.

'Farha' (2021) is a visually stunning, historically accurate film set in 1948 that depicts a relatively small-scale tragedy that Palestinians refer to as the Nakba (Arabic for "catastrophe"). The film doesn't detail the politics behind the arrival of the Israel Defense Forces. It primarily unfolds in a storage room, offering glimpses of life through a crack in the wall. Sound is used effectively to give color, further cementing the trauma of the experience in an emotional roller coaster. The storytelling techniques do not fail to describe the world beyond the walls: strafed by bullets, torn apart by cries of distress, and marred by an airless, oppressive quality.

... when your hands could reach the sky, when a future had been opened and your dreams had been awoken, with a chance to learn and teach, explore, investigate and seek, helping barriers erode, helping others to decode; but instead of unlocked doors, you're imprisoned by a war, observe the crimes of an invasion, through portals locked without salvation, inhumanity to man, to children, to families, by man, against the innocent civilians, who still suffer in their millions.

An outstanding performance by Karam Taher brings to life the torment, torture and tyranny endured during times of upheaval post WWII.