It needs to be said right away: Capernaum is an exceptional film. There is not one dead moment in the film. It is constantly captivating. The story of the two child protaganists, the twelve year-old Zain and the two-year old Yonas, in the poorest, dirtiest slum of Beirut is emotional without giving in to melodrama. 

Capernaum is the Lebanese director Nadine Labaki‘s third feature film. It is a multiple prize winning film, among them the prestigious Jury Prize at the Cannes Film Festival 2018. Labaki had shown earlier in her first two films Caramel (2007) and Where Do We Go Now? (2011) that she was more than capable to portray engaging, life-affirming stories, but Capernaum is much harsher and makes her reach another level of maturity and urgency. 

The title of the film is borrowed from the town in Galilee that according to the Gospel of Luke was predicted ”to go down to the depths”. In Arabic the word stands for chaos; it is an inferno, a hellish place without peace and goodness. Zain grows up in absolute poverty, in a dysfunctional, disorderly family with parents unable and unwilling to care for him. When his parents ”sell” his eleven year-old little sister to become the child bride of their exploitative, much older landlord, Zain has enough and runs off. His journey leads him to take care of the two year-old Yonas, trying to survive, to feed the child and to find a way to leave, preferably to Sweden. 

Zain is played by a Syrian refugee, Zain Al Raffeea, whom Labaki found in the streets of Beirut. He was an angry child, uneducated and small from malnutrition. Labaki had to adapt her story to how Zain understood the story as he was not able to read a written script. The grimness and sadness in the face of Zain and the innocent, responsive, sweet Yonas swerving together through the streets and slums of Beirut is heart-wrenching and unforgettable. 

In a recent interview Nadine Labaki expressed, “I really believe cinema can effect social change”. Visiting children in the slum, she relates the words of one of the children she met: “I don’t know why I was born if no one is going to love me”. There, she got the idea of the boy Zain, who went to court to sue his parents for giving birth to him. She wants to make her films count and seems to be uncompromisingly loyal to that vision. It makes me already look forward to her next film. The film world needs directors with this kind of unswerving loyalty to social change. 

Rinus April, 2019

*Image & video posted for non commercial purposes
under 'fair use' of copyright material in recommendation of the film

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