All three of director Danielle Arbid’s films have been banned in her native Lebanon. She talks censorship and Arab cinema
Lebanese film censors do not like Danielle Arbid. At least, that’s the way it looks. All three of her feature-length movies have been banned in Lebanon, while she has come under regular attack for daring to make movies about politics and the sexual and social liberation of women in her native country.
Understandably, Arbid is upset. Angry even. The official line from the country’s General Directorate of General Security for the banning of her most recent film, Beirut Hotel (pictured below), was that the movie mentioned the assassination of former prime minis
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This article made me go and watch the film. After watching it, I think that Danielle either lived too long abroad so she forgot how things are in Lebanon, or she totally has no clue about her country even before she left. Still though, her film already recognizes two intelligence services (meaning two political powers) in Lebanon. It also shows a witness of Hariri murder who gets assassinated by one of these political powers. She even gives an obvious pointer to the party involved in the crime. I can’t let go of my total satisfaction that she knows that the censorship is mainly controlled by the –let’s say- the conservative political power, which she accuses of committing the murder. As such, I can’t understand how would she expect her film to pass!