In Lebanon, contemporary history isn’t taught at school. This is what we are told at the beginning of Do You Love Me, the debut documentary feature by Beirut-born director Lana Daher, which had its world premiere as a Special Event at the 22nd Giornate degli Autori of the 82nd Venice Film Festival. In Lebanon, there isn’t even a national archive, and this small film, just over an hour long, is an important step towards building a shared audiovisual memory: it is made up exclusively of archival footage that embrace about 70 years of the country’s history and culture, and for the occasion, the director has created a website with an index of the material included in the project (click here), in order to systematise the Lebanese cinematic heritage and share it with a local and an international audience.

Do You Love Me is a documentary that doesn’t follow a chronological order, it goes forwards and backwards in time, but, as we are reminded, “disorientation is par for the course: welcome to Lebanon”. Snippets from films, TV broadcasts and reports, photographs and amateur films are skilfully combined (by Qutaiba Barhamji, the recognised editor of films such as the multi-award-winning Still Recording [+lire aussi :
critique
bande-annonce
fiche film] and Kaouther Ben Hania’s films Four Daughters [+lire aussi :
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bande-annonce
interview : Kaouther Ben Hania
fiche film] and The Voice of Hind Rajab [+lire aussi :
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interview : Kaouther Ben Hania
fiche film]) to reconstitute the fragments of life, both social and political, of a country that falls and always gets back up, in the middle of explosions, bombings, gutted houses (“it’s just the walls, we are alive”, says a young reporter as she shows what remains of her room), cars on fire, missing persons.

But there isn’t only death and destruction in this film. There is also the sea, scenes of joy and freedom, weddings, births, people dancing, kids playing, projects to rebuild, in a succession of images that proceeds by thematic association and suggestions. The scenes we see on screen were taken from 106 independent Lebanese films, for 20,000 sources total consulted, from various archives. Without any commentary or voice-over, the images are left to speak for themselves, and sounds and songs help shape a rich and multiform emotional landscape. Lana Daher’s films dialogues well with another Lebanese title selected this year in Giornata degli Autori, in competition: A Sad and Beautiful World [+lire aussi :
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interview : Cyril Aris
fiche film] by Cyril Aris (winner of the Audience Award), which wonders whether it is worth staying in a country continuously martyred by wars, or whether one should look for a better life elsewhere. The two films complete each other, and Do You Love Me confirms that in Lebanon, life can be very sad, but also very beautiful.

Do You Love Me was produced by Films de Force Majeure (France) and My Little Films (Lebanon), and co-produced by Wood Water Films (Germany) and Studio Lemon (France). International sales are handled by Swiss-French outfit Lightdox.