Farha (2021)
(Netflix Streaming, December 2022) As I’ve mentioned a few times before, a significant portion of my movie watching is list-driven—largely based on a film’s total number of votes on IMDB. The intention here is to watch what was popular or had a cultural impact—but from time to time, oddball choices pop up. At least two or three movies per year end up on my list not because they were widely seen by many people, but because their vote totals were inflated by deliberate downvoting campaigns. Of those, half are Indian movies that, for some reason, have earned the enmity of Indian or Pakistani users (hence, perhaps, my muted enthusiasm for much of contemporary Indian cinema) and the other half is mired in endless political controversies in the Middle East. I would not have expected Farha to shoot overnight in the IMDB top-100 for 2021—writer-director Darin J. Sallam’s film is a sad and modest tale of oppression and death in 1940s Palestine as a young woman witnesses the death of nearly her entire village at the hands of Israeli soldiers. In other words, the furthest thing from a crowd-pleaser. It’s not a bad movie—competently, sensitively made with a tight focus on recounting a true story and shining a spotlight on a sordid slice of history for the benefits of contemporary viewers now that the generation that experienced those events first-hand is dying. It’s the kind of film to take in soberly, for viewers who take care to steel themselves that it won’t be a pleasant viewing experience. So, what would explain the remarkable number of votes earned by Farha? A downvoting campaign, of course—if you’ve paid attention to “Palestine… Israeli” a few lines above, you won’t be surprised to learn that the film upon Netflix release was vigorously criticized by Israeli commentators unable to stomach the thought that there may be distasteful actions in their history. (Take it from a Canadian: you’re better off on the truth-and-reconciliation path than the deny-and-antagonize one.) The palpable irony here is that every year, I end up seeing politically educative movies solely because of downvoting campaigns. Nicely done, fragile Israeli commentators—I wouldn’t have been exposed to that viewpoint without your efforts.