20 July 2015
BEIRUT: Its probably an exaggeration to say the salon flick is a romantic-comic subgenre of its own. Cinema being what it is, though, it seems only natural it should have a fondness for a space that specializes in crafting appearances. Filmmakers have enjoyed exploring the sensuality of getting the haircut and they have done so from the perspective of male and female characters witness Patrice Lacontes 1990 feature The Hairdressers Husband.
Yet audiences voyeurism has ensured that the most popular hair- removal films scrutinize the denizens of the women-only beauty salon.
As most Lebanese film buffs are aware, this variation on the rom-com theme was given a distinctly Beiruti accent in 2007 with the release of Nadine Labakis debut feature Sukkar al-Banat (Caramel).
An important commercial success for the writer-director, Sukkar al-Banat serves to highlight the strengths and weaknesses of the form.
As a harem-like gender-specific space, the salon most obviously allows unique opportunities for women to tell womens stories. Because they rely on ensemble casts, the stories tend to be light comic dramas. Like ensemble film generally, salon movies are ill-disposed to nuanced character studies though veteran directors sometimes manage this, especially if theyre working with seasoned actors.
The Arab worlds latest contribution to the salon film is Dgrad. The debut feature of the Gaza-born Palestinian writer-director team Tarazan and Arab Nasser had its world premiere at Cannes this past May, one of 11 features in the Semaine de la Critique program.
Dgrad is quite unlike the other SIC films, which have been enjoying a popular reprise at Metropolis Cinema-Sofil.
Though politics lingers in the background of many of those works most obviously the titles taking up Latin American and African stories that politics tends to be less partisan, and complemented by formal approaches that emulate one dialect or another of art house cinema.
This is not the case with Dgrad. Set in contemporary Gaza, the films primary location is Christines beauty salon, where 13 women taking advantage of the return of municipal electricity have gathered to be epilated, shorn and blown dry.
The cast of characters represent a varied assortment of humanity.
Christine (Victoria Balitska), the salon manager, is a Russian-born hairdresser who married a Palestinian man and found Gaza more appealing than the place she grew up in.
The middle aged Eftikhar (Hiam Abbass) has just got a divorce and is having herself preened in anticipation of an evening of romance.
Nominally tending Eftikhar, but actually on the phone for most of the afternoon, is Christines assistant Wadad (Maisa Abd ElHadi), whos in the midst of a tortured relationship with Ahmad (Tarazan Nasser), one of the mafia thugs who run the neighbourhood surrounding Christines salon.
In the chair next to Eftikhar, and her more obvious foil, is 27-year-old Salma (Dina Shebar), whos having her hair done for her wedding.
The two most prominent members of the peanut gallery of ladies awaiting their turn in Christines two chairs are Zeinab (Mirna Sakhla) and Safia (Manal Awad). A devout Hamas supporter, Zeinab is so strictly religious that she mysteriously wears her hijab in the salon, though there are no men present. In what appears to be a joking reference to religion being the opiate of the masses, Safia is maniacally addicted to prescription drugs.
Rounding out the cast are the bride-to-bes asthmatic mother; the shrewish bourgeois woman who will soon be Salmas terrifying mother-in-law and her daughter; a young woman who seems moments away from giving birth, and her sister; a stone-face woman whos a veteran divorcee and Christines young daughter.
The ladies conversation moves from things political to the stuff of gossip. The outside world of men persists in penetrating into their cloister, however, not least when Christines daughter looks outside to find a young lion sitting at the salon door.
At the other end of the leash is Ahmad, Wadads beau, who has liberated the big cat from the zoo in a manly expression of affection.
This portion of the Nassers story is based on an incident reported in Gaza in 2007, recalled by the filmmakers as Operation Liberate Lion. It saw Hamas administration gunmen launch a crackdown against a powerful local mafia family. Hamas declared objective with this bloody confrontation was to free a lion a family member had stolen from the zoo. In the film too, the lions theft offers a pretext for escalating violence.
Though partisan politics is much more present in Dgrad than most other SIC features, its premise is a clever one.
Setting the principle action in a ladies beauty salon in Gaza is promising because insofar as it isnt concerned with the world of Hamas rule, Israeli occupation and its male-dominated cast of characters it defies audience expectations.
The film doesnt ignore the multitude of daily tragedies that characterize life in Gaza, of course, but it does take advantage of the women-only salon to form a space of comic reflection upon Gazas absurdities, one that draws upon the many social and economic divisions that characterize life in Palestine, and in Gaza in particular.
The Nassers premise also evokes the promise of an ironic spin on previous salon-set rom-coms, whose plots and characters tend to be sterilized of any germ of politics.
Though the dialogue did elicit some chuckles among the films Beirut audience, Dgrad is an underwhelming experience on a whole.
Torn between a desire to depict contemporary Gaza and the complex characters of the women who reside there, the filmmakers consistently err on the side of illustration, and a desire to lighten the load of the gunplay beyond the salons doors.
Already shackled by the restrictions of ensemble narrative, most members of the cast are preoccupied with illustrative observations about life in contemporary Gaza or pithy one-liners.
With the story dictated by still-unresolved political conflict, theres little room for character.
Copyright The Daily Star 2015.
