A gripping gay romantic drama will make its Philadelphia debut as part of the 17th annual Israeli Film Festival, March 2-17.
“Out in the Dark,” the debut film written by Michael Mayer and Yael Shafrir and directed by Mayer, follows the troubled love affair between two men on opposite sides of the Mid-East conflict. Nimr is a struggling Palestinian student with a student visa that allows him to take classes in Tel Aviv, as well as take in the city’s gay nightlife away from the rampant homophobia and antigay violence where he lives. Roy is a successful Israeli lawyer who harbors a growing discomfort with the work he does as part of the family business. Both struggle to keep their relationship together amid tense family ties, political tensions and their own personal demons, as well as the harsh realities they face in both communities.
Mayer, who was born and raised in Israel and has lived in Los Angeles for the past 18 years, said both he and Shafrir were inspired to write the film because of the stories they heard about the struggles of gay and lesbian Palestinians.
“A friend of mine was living in Israel a few years back and told me he was volunteering at a gay and lesbian center in Tel Aviv. And one of the things that the center does is give support to gay Palestinians who are hiding in Israel illegally. That blew me away,” he said. “Even as an Israeli, I never knew about that. I never knew that was going on. The BBC estimated that at any given time there are over 300 gay Palestinians who are hiding in Israel illegally. And I thought there is a story and a movie there. I went back to Israel to do some research and I met people from the gay community in Israel and Palestine and talked to people at the gay and lesbian center in Tel Aviv and the Open House in Jerusalem and got to know the communities inside and out. I met people who were hiding here and met people who had partners that were hiding here and people who were helping people get out. Basically that’s how the script came about.”
Mayer said the main characters in the film, much like the LGBT activists he has spoken to, aren’t striving to be overtly political, but their personal interests dictate that they get involved in some form.
“What’s interesting to me is—and the U.S. is the same way—you have people who are political activists with a political agenda,” he said. “There are people who are extreme left-wing. Israelis who go and demonstrate for Palestinian rights. The people at the gay and lesbian center in Tel Aviv aren’t necessarily people who have a political agenda. They work at the gay and lesbian center. They aren’t political activists, but because they are in a place and position where they need to help these people, they step up and do something that can be viewed as a very political action. That’s what really drew me to this particular story. Both Roy and Nimr are not political animals: Roy, he has led a good life, and Nimr, because he’s looking outside, he wants to get out. So they both feel that they float above and away from the political reality of the conflict. But when that conflict enters your bedroom or when the political becomes the personal, then people are going to get up and act. I felt it was moving to think of gay men and women from both sides of the fence collaborating and helping each other, not out of a political agenda but out of a shared experience of being a minority in their own communities. Palestine is still not considered a state, which creates the gray area of legal rights for its people when it comes to traveling, crossing the border and even getting refugee status in certain areas.”
Roy and Nimr’s relationship is just as complicated as the social and political climates of the area in which they live. And without giving away too much of the plot, whether or not the two have a happy ending is up to interpretation, as the film’s end is ambiguous at best — but still satisfying.
Mayer said the ending of the film means different things to people depending on their culture.
“When we were cutting the film in Los Angeles, we were testing it with a group of friends and the general reaction was that it was a really depressing ending. The producer was testing it with Israeli audiences, and their reaction was that it was a happy ending. People react to the ending based on culture in a lot of ways. In every Q&A, audiences ask about the ending. It was written that way and that’s how we felt. Politically, even though Yael leans more to the right and I lean more to the left, we both are pretty pessimistic when it comes to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. We don’t see a resolution to this, not in the near future. But at the same time, as we were discussing stuff, we felt that we did have hope. We do feel that even though we are not seeing a bright future right now, we are not hopeless. I feel that we both wanted to parlay that into the script.”
Whether people think the ending is grim or uplifting, so far the film has been garnering acclaim on the festival circuit and won the title of Best Picture at the 2012 Haifa International Film Festival.
“It’s been amazing,” Mayer said of the response the film has generated. “We premiered in Toronto. Every festival that we have been to has been sold-out or close to selling out. I’m interested to see how the movie is received in Israel. The reaction in Hamburg has been amazing. We sold the movie for theatrical release in the U.K., France, Germany, Belgium, Luxembourg, Switzerland, Spain, Brazil, Taiwan, Eastern Europe and Canada, so the movie has performed beyond my expectations.”
“Out in the Dark” is screened as part of the Israeli Film Festival of Philadelphia, 7 p.m. March 10 at Bryn Mawr Film Institute, 824 W. Lancaster Ave., Bryn Mawr. The film will premier in theaters in July. For more information on the film and the festival, visit www.iffphila.com or www.m-appeal.com/M-Appeal.com/our_films/Pages/OUT_IN_THE_DARK.html.