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A House in Jerusalem (12A)
Directed by Muayad Alayan
PALESTINIAN filmmaker Muayad Alayan explores the lasting effects and scars of the 1948 Nakba against Palestinians through this eerie and haunting supernatural drama.
Directed by Alayan, who co-wrote it with his brother Rami, the film follows Rebecca (Miley Locke), a young British Jewish girl who moves with her father Michael (Johnny Harris) from the UK to their ancestral home in Jerusalem seeking a fresh start in the wake of her mother’s tragic death.
The film, which is semi-autobiographical, is seen through the eyes of Rebecca who is crippled by grief. As unexplained things begin to occur in the house Michael believes Rebecca may be to blame, but she discovers that it is a young Palestinian girl called Rasha (Sheherazade Farrell) who used to live there. She explains to Rebecca how her family were forced to leave during the Nakba and she has been hiding in the well waiting for their return.
The two youngsters befriend each other, but the problem is only Rebecca can see her.
So is she a ghost or merely a figment of Rebecca’s imagination? Since Rasha is too scared to venture outside the house grounds, Rebecca decides to track down her family who moved to Bethlehem. There she is slowly confronted with the realities of the current political climate and a shattering truth.
This is Alayan’s most personal film to date and deals with the trauma and survival of his parents and his grandmother. It is exceedingly unsettling and scary on numerous fronts, and driven by captivating and disquieting performances by Locke (There She Goes) and newcomer Farrell in her first ever film role.
Through the constructs of this ghost story it examines Israeli-Palestinian relations and how Palestinians were forced from their homes which were then repossessed by the authorities and sold off to the likes of Michael’s family.
But it is also a moving study of love and loss ending on a shocking and thought-provoking note.
It is bold and refreshing and it could not be more timely.
Out in cinemas May 31
