The drama “Bleeding Dust” is a Palestinian production that mimics reality

Part of the scenes from the series Bleeding Soil (Al Jazeera)

Nablus

- In the first scene of “Bleeding Dust,” the features of the Israeli prison appear: the watchtower, the female guard, the lights, the barbed wire, and deep below it, dust particles are scattered over a hole that Palestinian prisoners dig from inside their cell in the Israeli Ofer prison near Ramallah, to turn into a cordon. Rescued them after they managed to escape.

After escaping, the four prisoners continue their journey after being divided into two groups, and the occupation is able to arrest two of them, while Bilal (the hero character) and his companion succeed in reaching his village, “Tal al-Sabr”, and there he kidnaps himself for a moment to see his mother before the occupation storms the village and raids his family’s home. However, Bilal flees to the village cemetery.

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In the cemetery, an armed clash takes place between the occupation soldiers and Bilal, his fellow prisoner, and a third who joined them. The occupation kills two of them, one of whom is thought to be Bilal. It later becomes clear that Bilal miraculously escaped death, after he was rescued by the aunt “Umm Askar,” who shelters the pursuers, and gives him the name “Umm Askar” in disguise. windy".

Umm Askar is one of the heroes of bleeding soil and shelters the persecuted (Al Jazeera)

Inspired by reality

Then Bilal continues under his new name, “Asif,” after the occupation closed his security file by claiming that he was killed, and his companions, especially Yasser, who comes from the Jenin camp and Jihad, who is from his village, “Tal al-Sabr,” and the youth’s journey continues by embodying the Palestinian national line without forgetting the humanitarian line of each one of them.

Thus, the events of “Bleeding Dust” by Palestinian director Bashar Al-Najjar continue with their various details and interesting narrative to tell Palestine and its national cause in a dramatic work that is the first of its kind and the only Palestinian this year, and which was also distinguished by the Palestinianness of its production, photography and acting.

There is a real reality embodied by Al-Najjar’s work, which is reflected not only by the smoothness and diversity of events, but also by their closeness to the scene that Palestinians live on a daily basis. The escape from the occupation prisons was recorded by 6 prisoners in early September 2021, with 6 of them escaping from the Israeli Gilboa prison.

The character of Bilal, on which the idea of ​​the series is based, is inspired by the story of a Palestinian resistance sung by the late Palestinian artist Abu Arab in his song “Oh Yama, there is a knock on our door, Ya Yama Hai (this is) the knock of our loved ones,” and even Umm Askar is a national character. She formed an incubator for the persecuted during the Al-Aqsa Intifada in 2000 in her home in the Old City of Nablus.

The series, which consisted of 30 television episodes of 40 minutes each, and included 50 Palestinian actors and more than 20 artistic staff, had been in Najjar’s mind for 4 years, but its writing and filming came after the war on Gaza on the 7th of last October, as Al-Najjar's attempts to produce the second part of his series, which he presented last year, "Umm al-Yasmine," were unsuccessful.

The realism of the series produced by Ready Production Company is seen by Al-Najjar as an attempt to create psychological victory and a state of national awareness by devoting and embodying national concepts, and by presenting and copying real scenes within the photography, which made them close to the viewer.

Completion in record time

The film's realism also comes from the Palestinian society's thirst for real drama that reflects its image, while this drama is a form of struggle and conveys the Palestinian message.

These scenes were evident in Asif’s portrayal of the private side of his resistance, while the series as a whole narrates the general life of the village of Tal al-Sabr, and the settlers’ attacks and assaults on it and its school and their bullying, which is a condition that the Palestinians live daily in their villages and areas.

For more than a month, Osama Malhas, the writer of the series, devoted himself to writing it and writing its details. He is writing for the first time, as he says, in a national television drama, as he devoted his previous writings to religious and social theatrical and dramatic work.

Writer Malhas told Al Jazeera Net that the difficulty was the challenge of writing quickly and choosing the work team and filming locations, which targeted 35 locations.

Also, the work force does not necessarily come from the work of the screenwriter or writer, but rather through the director Al-Najjar, who was able to accomplish this in record time and transform simple ideas into a “great” work, according to his description.

As a writer, Malhas believes that “the director holds the keys to the strength and weakness of any dramatic work, but specialists can comment on whether they can capture the strengths of the scenario and dialogue, while the general viewer judges by the scene whether it is beautiful or not.”

Part of the scenes from the series Bleeding Soil shows the occupation army storming the village school (Al Jazeera)

Difficult production conditions

But is drama required to reflect reality? A question answered by Palestinian art critic Saeed Abu Mualla by saying that drama may choose events from reality and build a dramatic treatment on them to achieve goals related to society, but in the Palestinian context it has become required to pay attention to reality and pay attention to it, especially in light of the absence of Arab drama from the Palestinian scene among the dozens of series produced. And even the Israeli-Arab conflict.

Today - Abu Mualla adds to Al Jazeera Net - the Palestinian issue is gaining more importance in light of the war it is experiencing that has almost ended its sixth month. “Here we see that Al-Najjar, through the bleeding of the soil, was completely loyal to the Palestinian reality, and sought to address it dramatically.”

This became evident, according to Abu Mualla, in the presence of the environment, Palestinian details, and the vocabulary of life, such as the cemetery, martyrs, settlement, and weapons, and he dealt with that in a creative way. Most importantly, Al-Najjar, in the opinion of the Palestinian critic, is the owner of a dramatic project, and struggles to produce a work, within very difficult production conditions in the Palestinian context, and this is taken into account. for him.

It is also believed that the work is compatible with the general Palestinian situation, and this is “promising,” says Abu Mualla, who confirmed that there is personal belief from the director, and from a group of actors, in the work and its success.

“Bleeding Dust” reflects a qualitative leap compared to Al-Najjar’s previous works, as the director is not the same as the screenwriter, and there is an elaborate soundtrack, and an improvement in acting, but due to the need for “specific work,” it was necessary to work more diligently in the area of ​​acting.

Abu Mualla says, "We are not talking about comedic clips, but rather characters who live through conflicts and intellectual and political positions." He added, "But it must be taken into account that, in light of the general state of fear today in adopting the discourse of resistance, the series went beyond that and dealt with it dramatically."

Source: Al Jazeera