Behind the scenes of Emirati thriller

This content was originally posted in 7DAYS UAE website at: Behind the scenes of Emirati thriller An Arab neo-noir movie – that’s not something you can see every day at local cinemas. So when Image Nation announced its latest feature film ‘Zinzana’ (Rattle the Cage) to be a single-set psychological thriller, people were intrigued and a bit sceptical – will this work? Director Majid Al Ansari – who previously worked with the Abu Dhabi production house in films ‘The Intruder!’ and ‘From A to B’ – asked himself the same when he found the script on The Black List, an online script database. “It’s an incredible website and there’s thousands of scripts around the world. I signed up, just kept reading and then I fell upon Zinzana,” he says of the material written by husband-and-wife Ruckus and Lane Skye. “We thought ‘I don’t know if this is an Arab film, but what if it is an Arab film? This could be something different. One thing that I loved about it is it’s very character-based, it could be about anywhere around the world.” Directed by an Emirati, written by Americans and starring Palestinian duo Saleh Bakria and Ali Suliman plus Saudi Ahd Kamel, the film’s identity doesn’t belong to any specific country. The story revolves around the alcoholic Talal (Bakria), who wakes up in small town jail cell in the middle of a barren nowhere. Then in barges moustached, psychotic policeman Dabban (Suliman), hell bent on breaking him emotionally and physically. Their violent cat-and-mouse game begins as Talal tries to protect his family. Suliman, who starred in the Golden Globe winner ‘Paradise Now’ and Oscar-nominated ‘Lone Survivor’, sees his villainous role as a wonderful opportunity. He said: “For the first time as a Palestinian, I played a role that has nothing to do with the Palestinian cause. I think it was a wonderful opportunity for me as an actor. Of course we suffer, but I didn’t want to play that. I had the opportunity to play something artistic.” Suliman didn’t have enough time to research the character, but Al Ansari helped. “I had this guidance with regards to the genre, which was odd for me, but interesting at the same time. Majid was very knowledgeable and he knew what he wanted so that helped a lot. We reviewed the film intensively; the filming happened in a chronological manner, which is also different and helped us developed the character.” The entire production was shot in a built set inside a soundproof warehouse, with five weeks of preparation and five weeks of filming done in a linear pace. Producer Rami Yasin commends the cast and crew for being the cogs to this clockwork. “There was not a shot in that film that we didn’t plan or not know about, and this is a testament on the way Majid works. Basically, we all went in there knowing exactly what were going to do every single day.” Yasin points out an extra character in the movie. “The camera was a silent observer. It was always the perspective of the boy until we went outside. And I think this was one of the very interesting choices that Majid did as a director – he said ‘I want the camera to be a character not an observer.’ And actually it’s possibly the only free character in the film.” The on-goings behind the camera bled through the final product. “It was a beautiful thing at the beginning. We were at this warehouse, but it was like a prison inside a prison, and we would go in at 9am and get out at 9pm. Being confined in one place is difficult psychologically. On the last week, I thought I couldn’t go on,” laughs Suliman. glaiza@7days.ae Read the original story at: Behind the scenes of Emirati thriller