My Name Is Not Ali
Travelling between Germany, France, and Tunisia, Viola Shafik reconstructs and deconstructs the unknown life story of El Hedi Ben Salem through interviews with his companions and family members as well as archival material. With openness and slight naivety, the interviewees explain how “Ali” became an oriental object of projection for the Fassbinder group, while El Hedi Ben Salem, the human being, was overlooked in order to establish the foreigner as “other.” A no-frills examination of a piece of German and Munich film history.
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📋 Film Details
| Original Title | Jannat 'Ali |
| Year | 2011 |
| Country | Egypt, Germany |
| Genre | Documentary |
| Director | Viola Shafik |
| Runtime | 98 min. |
| Rating | TMDB: 5.8/10 (5 votes) |
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🎬 MovieFinder's Take
The film constructs its inquiry through a process of deconstruction, relying on personal testimonies and archival footage to separate the myth from the man. It explores the mechanisms of creating the 'other' within a Western cultural context without offering facile judgments.
What lingers after viewing is a sober, unvarnished examination of a piece of film history, where a personal tragedy becomes a lens for complex questions of identity and appropriation. — MovieFinder Editorial
Director: Viola Shafik
Best Watched
With focused attention, to absorb the nuances of each testimony.
🎭 Cast
El Hedi ben Salem
Self (archive footage)
Rainer Werner Fassbinder
Self (archive footage)
Abd El-Kader Jarrary
Self (Ben Salem's Son)
Hafsia Mellaim
Self (Ben Salem's former wife)
Viola Shafik
Self (voice)
Renate Leiffer
Self
Irm Hermann
Self
Karl Scheydt
Self
Rudolf Waldemar Brem
Self
Hans Hirschmüller
Self
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