Middle Eastern Female Filmmakers Give Glimpse of Once-Veiled Worlds - Danna Harman

Tel Aviv - In the Middle East, women have a new voice: the movies. As nascent film industries bloom in the region, a few emerging women directors are probing some of the most delicate subjects within their male-dominated communities, giving viewers a glimpse into once-veiled worlds.

"Women realized that they were in double jeopardy -- of having Westerners speak for them, and men speak for them ... so they got behind the cameras," says Mona Eltahawy, a New York-based Egyptian commentator and lecturer on Arab and Muslim issues.

The Monitor recently contacted three such filmmakers -- Israeli Arab Ibtisam Maraana and Buthina Canaan Khoury of the Palestine Territories; and Haifaa Al-Mansour of Saudi Arabia -- to talk about their hard-won successes.

In time, these directors may come to emulate the commercial fortunes of Nadine Labaki's Caramel, a comedic social commentary set inside a Beirut beauty salon that became Lebanon's top-grossing film of 2007, or Marjane Satrapi's Persepolis, the Oscar-nominated film based on her childhood in Iran. (Both films are in release in the U.S.) But the three directors are wary of being pigeon-holed, a notion voiced by Satrapi, who lives in France. [for more click on the heading]