Coming to theatres today, Friday, December 11: THE TAINTED VEIL
Nahla al Fahad, Mazen al Khayrat, and Ovidio Salazar’s exploration of the hijab debuted at Carmel this Fall. Other fests have included Dubai and Jakarta.
As signaled by their choice of title, filmmakers al Fahad, al Khayrat, and Salazar knew they were taking on a contentious issue. In the wake of recent xenophobic and anti-Muslim rhetoric spewed by presidential hopefuls and pundits, their film also takes on an unfortunate topicality. While very rough around the edges, this consideration of the hijab and its place within the faith of Islam at the very least aims for dialogue rather than one-sided polemics. Conventional in construction, largely consisting of a survey of talking heads who reflect on personal and spiritual reasons for wearing, or in some cases, not wearing, the veil, the doc feels overlong and repetitive at times. Without sufficient space afforded to a deeper probing of the historical and cultural importance and context of religious practice and women’s place within what has long been a male-dominated sphere, the project feels too surface level to offer any major insight.
what (not) to doc 