The first of two pieces about local filmmaker Ziad Hamzeh
A few years ago Swampscott filmmaker Ziad Hamzeh was in Tunisia as a member of a panel on the Arab film industry, and he was asked his opinion of the state of Arab films.
Arab movies, he replied, were “in a dismal state.” They were making movies about “what the West has done to us” rather than “stories that come from within.” The best stories, he emphasized, are the ones that tell the world about what a people care about, what they value and yearn for.
Find out what's happening in Swampscottwith free, real-time updates from Patch.
His words caught the ear of the well known Tunisian director, Ridha Behi.
Behi was also in a dismal state. He had been working with Marlon Brando, living and filming in the actor’s house in LA for several months, when Brando died.
Find out what's happening in Swampscottwith free, real-time updates from Patch.
This left his project in shambles. When Behi heard Hamzeh speak, he thought Hamzeh would understand how to rescue the months of filming.
Hamzeh agreed, and the result is Always Brando, a movie which opened this August at the Toronto Film Festival, where, Hamzeh says, it was “beautifully received.”
The movie weaves the story of Marlon Brando, film icon aging in Los Angeles, and a young Tunisian man, who bears a striking resemblance to the young Brando. As Hamzeh puts it, he and Behi “created a narrative to glue the two stories together.”
Set in the US and in Tunisia, the young man catches the Hollywood bug and is desperate to get to California and fulfill his dream of making it as an actor, as Brando looks over his own illustrious career with disappointment. The trailer begins, “Early on I understood that cinema, which can create dreams, can also create the worst catastrophes.”
As producer, Hamzeh was “responsible for everything”—hiring and firing and making things come together. He is currently in Tunisia preparing the final celluloid version which will show at the Dubai Film Festival on October 18.
Other Hamzeh films include the documentary, Adrift, which tells the harrowing tale of a boat trip taken by western African men to Spain and Italy in search of jobs.
The journey is called “the fight” — small, open boats travel up the coast in the open Atlantic on a regular basis, with so many not making it that bodies regularly wash ashore.
In Adrift, a Pulitzer Prize nominated journalist has managed to sneak onto one of the boats, and he continues to film as the boat begins to fall apart.
Hamzeh has also been involved in making a trio of baseball movies, Henry O!, Play By Play Men, and Bleacher Boys.
Perhaps his best known film, however, is the award winning documentary, The Letter: An American Town and “the Somali Invasion.”
A trim and handsome man, Hamzeh is married to Nina Cullen-Hamzeh, who is the principal of the Marblehead Charter School. Before moving to the North Shore, they spent many years in Los Angeles, where Hamzeh helped to found and run the Open Fist theatre company. The couple moved back east in order to raise their children close to family.
Hamzeh calls Swampscott an “eclectic community … with a lot of interesting people and lots going on for such a tiny place,” adding that “This is home for me.”
And then he smiles as he shows off the latest renovation to his house—an indoor pool converted to a small movie theatre.
For more information on Hamzeh’s work and to view trailers of some of his films, visit: http://www.hamzehmystiquefilms.com/main/home.htm
His work is also available on Netflix and at Amazon.
Next week: Hamzeh’s award winning documentary--The Letter: An American Town and “the Somali Invasion"
