5 Broken Cameras, or: Durability in the face of turmoil

5 Broken Cameras (2011)

Directed by Emad Burnat and Guy Davidi

***SPOILERS***

As with most documentaries, 5 Broken Cameras has its centerpiece. But it’s entirely too simple to label that centerpiece as the struggle between Palestinians and Israelis. Like the legitimacy of art in Exit Through the Gift Shop or the threat of global warming in The Island President, the centerpiece of 5 Broken Cameras is what drives the story, what motivates the filmmaker, and ultimately comes to document and give a title to Emad Burnat’s incredible portrait: five broken cameras. There’s something inherently beautiful about the mere presence of a camera—the absolute single necessity for any film—coming to represent and transcend the larger political scope surrounding the film, while also representing the humanity behind/in front of the camera. In This Is Not a Film, fireworks loudly burst outside as an iguana slowly crawls inside an apartment, representing Jafar Panahi’s struggles and desires as a filmmaker under house arrest. Even in documentaries, images are utilized just as any narrative would dictate so, with the filmmaker a puppeteer and the surroundings at his/her disposal. But the key and most important piece of imagery in 5 Broken Cameras isn’t an extraneous factor utilized—it simply exists; it must exist.

For Emad, his camera is his third eye, a permanent addition to his body to satisfy his insatiable desire to capture the political turmoil that floods his small Palestinian village. Emad brought a camera to film his son’s birth, and then became transfixed on relating the horrors his fellow citizens are exposed to each and every day. Instead of filming life, Emad instead came to capture death and despair. And not just the death of people on television, but his closest friends and family members. It’s one factor of why 5 Broken Cameras is almost too intimate to evaluate, as assessing the meaning of Emad’s five broken cameras and their function in the narrative could never eclipse the pure image of his cameras strewn across a table.

In her review for Variety, Leslie Felperin says of the film: “It pays scant attention to the larger political context or, indeed, the strategies and tactics of protest in an age that offers sophisticated means of media management.” Emad indeed does make a statement by never stretching his film to Felperin’s standards. She makes a comparison to Burma VJ, but even that film’s most humane and somber moments existed in its simplest, horrific images—this is the entirety of 5 Broken Cameras.

But to reach the true horrors one must start from the beginning, just as Emad did, and that would begin with the birth of his son Gibreel. A sign of things to come, the camera is purchased for this joyous event, just before sidling its way into the daytime air to capture an Israeli settlement being constructed on Bil’in’s property. Every year Emad films Gibreel’s next birthday, and every year more turmoil strikes Bil’in. The growing maturity of his son is both captured and advanced by Emad’s various cameras, introducing their narrative function along with their ironically fragile presence. For while Bil’in physically deteriorates, it’s the foundation of the village’s citizens that must remain intact. For Emad, that comes coupled with the burdens of family and parenthood.

Perhaps the one legitimate knock against 5 Broken Cameras is the lack of dissection regarding this intrinsically juxtaposed accountability. But once again, the most powerful answers in 5 Broken Cameras exist in the simplest moments, and such accountability is presented by the mere fact that Emad has chosen to explore the mental effects of war and protest on his son. Like going to your first day of school is your initiation into a new world, it seems almost ritualistic to witness Emad driving Gibreel into turmoil for his “first protest”. Emad’s wife looks at Gibreel with fascination and encouragement in his excitement, for today Gibreel will witness and endure the physical, real-time images that oppress his family. Never asking questions about such horrors, Gibreel is instead rather excited by the prospects of protest, reenacting the marches with his friends and smiling ecstatically when reminiscing of the day’s events.

And then, one day…people die. A boy dies. Another boy dies. Phil, the town’s most beloved and vocal protestor, dies fighting for Bil’in. And the questions from Gibreel begin. The questions, the questions, the questions…with no discernible answers from Emad. “Why did the soldiers kill my friend?” How do you answer such a question? In what began as a loving tribute to his son’s birth became a representation of war’s effect on family—a father-son dynamic that can’t be assessed and tampered with, but merely presented in chronological order, which just happens to coincide with the bullet-ridden cameras owned by Emad. The fact that Emad’s only definable presence in the film is his melancholic narration screams his crippling role as a father. For Emad never vocally provides answers (much to Felperin’s dismay), but instead provides those answers to his son's questions by remaining a silent and peaceful protestor. His wife screams at him, begging him to cease filmmaking for the sake of his family. An issue never directly addressed beforehand and never addressed again, such a moment depicts Emad’s own confused state over his motivation. He even says to himself (in a tiny moment of irony, as the camera will later inadvertently save his life): “I feel like the camera protects me, but it's an illusion.” There’s no sole reason to attach to Emad’s desire to film as much as there’s no answer to such a larger conflict—all he can do is keep filming.

By doing so, Emad captures a much more important and untold tale with his five broken cameras, all of which—along with their own increasingly violent damage—depict the increasing level of violence from the Israelis and the growing frustration in the villagers of Bil’in. When Phil “The Elephant” is killed, it creates a rise in the town that was unmatched by any other moment, including the deaths of several boys and kidnappings throughout the village. More than the fact that these people were losing their village and deemed as "settlers" by the opposition, the death of one courageous human being ignited a fury Phil strove to extinguish. As people gather around his funeral and then disperse with rage, we are presented with the tragic image of Bil’in villagers finally attacking the standing soldiers, who fight the onslaught of fists and rocks with tear gas and bullets, depicting the image we so often witness on the news, but never with the knowledge that it took five years (and five broken cameras) to culminate in such depressing form. And it’s during these moments that we witness Emad losing his fifth and final camera—a bullet rips through it, leading into the epilogue with the lasting image of turmoil, destruction, endless war.

As each camera is recycled, its contents disappear with it. The questions from Gibreel amount. His wife becomes more distressed and concerned. The smile fades from the once jubilant Daba. Adeeb’s own righteous, peaceful anger results in physical retaliation. Perhaps the sole consistent image of 5 Broken Cameras was Phil, whose desire to mend the hearts and minds of the opposing Israeli forces (represented most poignantly by his embrace of a tree, exclaiming, "We were born on this land!") was only silenced by a bullet. This is how Emad not answers, but responds to those questions from his son. From the distresses of his wife. From the question, “Why keep going?”

Phil screams at the standing soldiers surrounding his town, begging them to turn away and free the citizens of Bil’in. But their silent stares are just as telling as Emad’s muted presence. These soldiers are not brutes, but products of a system, and their only purpose is to portray the effects their actions have on others. Addressing any more than that would be a travesty on Emad’s part, as the horrifying image of Phil being shot makes the story far more compelling than the answers. Once again recalling the line, “I feel like the camera protects me, but it's an illusion,” Emad almost asks a question of his own, speaking of a much larger concern never addressed verbatim—shouldn’t we be protected from this? Emad displays that focusing on the larger political context isn’t nearly as forceful and informative as working within the confines of Bil’in, where physical and mental destruction can be displayed through the deterioration of a town, the growth of a child, and five broken cameras.