Lebanese director Mounia Akl: «Creation is an act of freedom».»

Cinema Wednesdays - Alice Bruxelle

Mounia Akl is a Lebanese director. In a country where there is no funding for cinema, she relies on international co-productions. For her, the seventh art has become an act of resistance and freedom. Just like music, or humor, «one of the ways of surviving in Lebanon» on a psychological level. Her latest film, Costa Brava, Lebanon, tells the real-life story of a family set against the backdrop of Lebanon's political crisis. Meet the director.

Le Regard Libre: Your film indirectly criticizes the Lebanese government. How was it received by the general public and the country's ruling class?

Mounia Akl: It’s a film in which I try to examine the structure of a system that doesn’t work through the microcosm of this family, which finds itself held hostage—just like the Lebanese people today—by a corrupt ruling class. I don’t know how she would react if she saw the film. We’ll see! The film hasn’t been released in theaters yet, so I don’t know. I don’t think the ruling class would view cinema as a threat. I don’t think they perceive the power of cinema in the same way we do. There isn’t even any funding for cinema in Lebanon.

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What is the state of the film industry in Lebanon?

We have a small but vibrant industry that’s growing steadily, with very talented technicians and filmmakers. Lebanon has so many stories to tell—and so much talent. But since there’s no domestic funding, the industry can’t function without support from international funds. That’s why the Lebanese film industry relies on international co-productions. As for my film, it’s a co-production with France, Switzerland, and Denmark.

These countries allow us to bring in funds to hire Lebanese people as well. The Danish fund, for example, has enabled us to work with Peter Hjorth, who did the special effects for Lars von Trier and those for Costa Brava, Lebanon, because the landfill is recreated using special effects. Unfortunately, the only funds in the Arab world are those like the Doha Film Institute’s, which are exceptional. In Lebanon, cinema is the last thing that matters to our politicians.

Submarine, released in 2016, depicted the Lebanese garbage crisis. Costa Brava, Lebanon, released five years later, also addresses this topic. How has this situation evolved?

In 2015, at the start of the waste crisis, it was an environmental crisis that served as the perfect example of everything that was going wrong in the country. It was also—and above all—a crisis rooted in corruption. Seeing my favorite landscapes—by the water, in the valleys—turn into mountains of trash really outraged me. A movement was born, «You stink,» led by young people who protested against the government, telling them, «It’s time for you to recycle yourselves.» When I wrote Submarine, it was a science-fiction movie. It’s about a city swallowed up by trash that everyone decided to evacuate.

Since 2015, even though the waste crisis—which the government has managed to sweep under the rug—is no longer noticeable, the country has completely collapsed due to the economic crisis and the surge in the 4th August and the COVID-19 crisis. The country has gradually become the one I had imagined in Submarine. The reality of the country has become worse than my dystopia. Costa Brava It turns out to be a realistic film. Which is very sad to admit.

At the end, Souraya says to Walid, «We need to know whether you love Lebanon or hate it.» I’ll turn that question right back to you.

The relationship is exhausting and toxic. When I leave Lebanon and look back at it from the plane, it’s very painful. I suffer, but it’s my city. We don’t want to give up on or hate something that has potential. But it’s something that wears us down and tears us apart. It puts us in a state of constant hysteria.

In Submarine, you film the streets and the people. Why did you choose to shoot the entire Costa Brava, Lebanon in a single geographic location—namely, the Badri family home?

When I make a movie, I always try to include what I felt was missing from the previous one. After Costa Brava, Lebanon, I want to make a movie with just one main character. When I was filming Submarine, I was in an urban setting, in a dystopia. In my latest film, I wanted to return to nature, to that bubble of denial that Lebanese people sometimes create for themselves. They’re sometimes in an apartment, sometimes in another country, or even out in nature. I wanted to set the film within that bubble of denial.

For the family, it was the nature and isolation of the city that robbed them of their dignity and broke their hearts. The city is explored through the characters’ memories and nostalgia. I wanted to explore this phenomenon that Lebanese people often experience as they try to protect themselves—until the day this family realizes that it’s impossible to do so. 

Do you see this choice of isolation and independence as an escape or an act of resistance?

It’s complicated. The Lebanese people’s choice to stay in the country is an act of resistance, but leaving the city is an act of flight. I don’t pass judgment on their choice, because I don’t judge the people who have chosen to leave Lebanon to build a new life for themselves. Still, I have enormous admiration for the people who have stayed to fight for a better world. The Lebanese expatriate who came to see the film yesterday—who mourns Lebanon every day and tries to help it—is also someone who takes action. I don’t pass judgment on how people cope with trauma.

In my film, each family member comes to realize over the course of the story that they want to make a different choice. The father runs away because he’s afraid; the mother left because she wanted to give this life in nature a chance. Every choice must be rational and not driven by fear. That’s why she chooses to reintegrate into the society they still want to fight for.

Political issues are always conveyed through a medium: television, smartphones, or the radio. We never see the reality on the ground. Political problems arise within the family. 

Lebanese people find themselves in a political context even without meaning to. Our decisions are shaped by that context. Even today, when a Lebanese person wants to work but can’t because of power outages. In Lebanon, there isn’t really a separation between the political and the personal. I wanted to observe a family under political pressure, which helps bring out their personal struggles. Is this a political film about our relationship with our country? Yes. My goal wasn’t to go out into the streets and make a documentary about the Lebanese revolution. I wanted to respect the subjective experience of characters who are isolated and who participate in it only through television.

You've managed to bring psychological complexity to a situation that could easily have fallen into black-and-white thinking. At times, one wonders if Walid's character isn't actually doing more harm than good by trying to do good.

As for the other male character—the one Tala falls in love with—it was important not to make him a «jerk,» because he’s a human being. Some men have said that Walid’s character was too mean. I completely disagree. I have a lot of love for the father’s character. After the August 4 explosion, I found myself relating to the father’s character. I was afraid of the city; I was controlling everything around me. That’s what I wanted to explore through him. He’s afraid. But that doesn’t help, because the women around him have to make their own decisions. In fact, by the end, he learns that he needs to listen to others.

Don't they say that the road to hell is paved with good intentions?

I agree. I wanted to create the illusion of a paradise and gradually show that a paradise isn’t really a paradise if we don’t agree on the rules that govern it. Souraya isn’t entirely convinced she belongs there. At the end of the film, Rim manages to draw Walid out of his shell of fear, and he decides to give the city a chance. It’s the victory of a little girl who decides to go out and see a world that has been hidden from her her whole life.

Music plays a very important role in your works. Hala was dancing in Submarine. Souraya was a singer. Does music have the power to inspire resistance?

Absolutely. Souraya lost her voice at the beginning, then gradually regained it as the film goes on when she decides to start singing again. It’s a way of expressing herself, just like filmmakers who make movies even though the country tells them to be silent. Creativity is an act of freedom.

Humor can also be very powerful. The character of Grandma Zeina is very funny, as is the ironic title of your film.

The grandmother character is played by a friend’s mother. She has never acted in a movie before. She’s the typical Lebanese grandmother. As for the film’s title, there’s an area in Lebanon, next to the airport, that used to resemble Costa Brava in Spain. Since then, that area has been destroyed and has become an illegal dump—the Costa Brava dump. People think it’s a nod to my Spanish screenwriter, but it’s not!

Zeina’s death takes place off-screen, as if you wanted to show that the tragedy lies not in the world of the dead, but in that of the living. This echoes her final words: «Stop taking life too seriously.».

One of the ways to survive in Lebanon is humor. The Lebanese have plenty of them. My father’s story gave me wings. He’s an architect, and during the explosion, his office and all the models he’d spent hours working on were destroyed. My father looked at them and said, «That’s Beirut,» even though he was devastated. He always finds a way to inject humor into a tragic situation. I wanted to incorporate that element through the character of the grandmother.

Female characters are important to you.

Absolutely. It was important to me to talk about several generations of women: the grandmother who feels she hasn’t lived her life, the little girl who has inherited her parents’ anxiety, the teenager who has been frustrated her whole life by a father who doesn’t want her to explore the world, and a mother who accepts that she can have a career while also being a woman and a mother. I wanted to explore the role of women in a society where even a man can be a victim—by being forbidden to cry at the age of five.

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Header image: © mouniaakl.com