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| Ossama Mohammed: / نجوم النهار / Nujum an-nahar / Stars in Broad Daylight (SY 1988). |
/ نجوم النهار / Étoiles du jour / Sterne des Tages / Estrellas de día.
SY 1988. Prod.: National Film Organization.
Director: Ossama Mohammed, Scen.: Ossama Mohammed. F.: Abdulqader Sharbaji. M.: Antoinette Azarieh. Scgf.: Rida Hus-hos. Int.: Abdellatif Abdul Hamid (Khalil), Zuhair Abdulkarim (Kasser), Sabah As-Salem (Sana), Saad Eddin Baqdoones (il nonno), Fuad Ghazi (Fuad), Muhsen Ghazi (amico di Kasser), Radwan Jamoos (Abbas), Zuhair Ramadan (Towfiq), Maha Saleh (la moglie di Khalil). 105’. Col.
Loc: Damascus.
Language: Arabic.
Restored in 4K in 2024 by The Film Foundation’s World Cinema Project and Cineteca di Bologna at L’Immagine Ritrovata laboratory, in collaboration with Ossama Mohammed, with funding provided by Hobson/Lucas Family Foundation. The restoration used the best surviving element outside Syria, a 35 mm positive print acquired by a German television network in the 1990s. Grading validated by Ossama Mohammed.
DCP with English subtitles by Katharine Halls from The Film Foundation..
Il Cinema Ritrovato, Bologna 2024: Cinemalibero.
Viewed with e-subtitles by L'Immagine Ritrovata in Italian at Jolly Cinema, 28 June 2024
Cecilia Cenciarelli (Bologna Catalogue 2024): " Syrian master Ossama Mohammed’s debut Nujum An-Nahar follows the inexorable dissolution of the Ghazi family on the eve of two marriages in a rural village in the Alawite coastal region, northwest of Damascus. The family microcosm, dominated by a despotic older brother (not coincidentally a quasi-sibling of Assad), is a biting allegory of the Baathist regime. Sarcastic and unconventional, Nujim An-Nahar is visually powerful, displaying in every shot Mohammed’s extraordinary talent: “Contrary to my fears, the National Film Organization did not impose any change to the script. Like other filmmakers of my generation, I quickly learnt to use words as hiding places; we knew we could rely only on images.” "
" Shown only once in Damascus in 1988 before an audience of artists and intellectuals, Nujum An-Nahar was immediately banned in Syria. However, eager to show itself as progressive and open in the eyes of Europe, the government allowed it to participate in Cannes’ Directors’ Fortnight and the Valladolid and Rabat festivals, following which it enjoyed a decent European distribution. Since the uprisings of 9 May 2011, Ossama has been an exile in France, where he fled for a masterclass with Costa-Gavras: “Le Monde had taken up my statements and the text signed by 99 Syrian artists bluntly condemning the regime. That night, an intellectual, a friend I trusted very much, informed me I was in great danger and I was not to ever return to Syria.” "
" For the past year, in a stubborn attempt to find any film element pertaining to Nujum An-Nahar I’ve had the privilege of speaking often and at length with Ossama: “Dictatorship is an existential issue, it affects us as human beings,” he told me during our last video call. “I believe deeply in my humanity and in the humanity of artists. Freedom means first of all imagination, there is no cinema without imagination, not even realist cinema. Dictatorship is the colonisation of our imagination and our humanity.” "
" With sincere thanks to Rasha Salti, Jean-Michel Frodon, Yuri Aguilar, Inma Trull Ortiz, Markus Ruff, and Irit Neidhardt. " Cecilia Cenciarelli (Bologna Catalogue 2024)
AA: A sure sense of the image is striking from the beginning in Ossama Mohammed's Nujum an-nahar: the composition, the mise-en-scène, the dynamic charge, the art of the ensemble play, the eye for the meaningful detail in quotidian life. The colour is refined, and the work as a whole is an achievement in purely visual poetry.
Part of the family is settling in Germany. Part is longing for ancestral roots in the lost home in Palestine. "Down with Israel, long live the Arab Nation". Impressive distant views from the hilltops surrounding Damascus put things into perspective.
There are comic and humoristic passages, not least in the cancelled wedding plans for Sana (Sabah As-Salem) who refuses to follow through arranged marriage strategies. If needed, she won't eat, she won't talk. But in the hands of the big brothers, it gets threatening. The only man Sana genuinely likes is an intellectual called Sami, but the brothers first cross-examine, then beat him brutally, and we never hear from him again.
A mesmerizing restoration of a film of great poetry and great underlying violence and unrest.
BEYOND THE JUMP BREAK: DATA FROM IMDB AND ARAB CULTURE FUND:
BEYOND THE JUMP BREAK: DATA FROM IMDB AND ARAB CULTURE FUND:
IMDb summary: " In his debut feature film, director Muhammad explores the inexorable dissolution of a family, ironically during the planning of a wedding, the kind of ritual that ought to bond family members together in shared joy. The film exposes the divisive dynamics of patriarchal oppression, and the terrible connections between familial and sociopolitical violence. " —Ari Herzog <aherzog@aleph0.clarku.edu>
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AFAC (Arab Culture Fund)
/ ولد أسامة محمد في اللاذقية - سوريا عام 1954، و تخرج من المعهد الروسي للتصوير السينمائي في عام 1979.
أما فيلمه الروائي الأول "نجوم النهار" فأنتج عام 1988. ويعتبر في نظر الكثيرين العمل السينمائي الأشد انتقاداً لمجتمع سوري عالق في قبضة نظام البعث الحديدية. لم يسمح بعرضه في سوريا. إلا أنه اختير للمشاركة في مهرجان كان السينمائي (أسبوعي المخرجين)، لينال استحسان النقاد، حاصداً السعفة الذهبية في مهرجان فالنسيا في نفس العام. /
Machine translated: Osama Mohammed was born in Latakia, Syria in 1954, and graduated from the Russian Institute of Cinematography in 1979. His first feature film, "Daytime Stars", was produced in 1988. It is considered by many to be the most critical cinematic work of a Syrian society trapped in the iron grip of the Baath regime. It was not allowed to be screened in Syria. However, it was selected to participate in the Cannes Film Festival (Directors' Fortnight), where it won critical acclaim, winning the Palme d'Or at the Valencia Film Festival that same year.
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