Khaberni - Cinema is considered a reflective mirror of the social reality we live in, and as an effective tool among the tools of culture, knowledge, and enlightenment, it has played its role as a means of guidance and counseling in reshaping societal values and habits in multiple locations, casting light on social issues through many artistic and dramatic works, including violence against women and honor crimes, and has taken up the defense of the most noble human right - the right to life, as guaranteed by divine laws and global constitutions where God Almighty said: "And do not kill the soul which Allah has forbidden except by [legal] right."
As stated in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, and in Article (6) of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, "the right to life is an inherent right for every human being and the law protects this right," and it was shown in a report published in 2006 on the website of the United Nations Development Fund for Women that "violence against women and girls is a problem of pandemic dimensions, as one in every three women worldwide has been subjected to violence."
Omani cinema has not been isolated from discussing issues related to women; the writer and director Suleiman Al-Khalili launched his artistic work through the short feature film "Ash," produced by the Omani Association for Cinema in 2023 starring: Youssef Al-Balushi, Ali Al-Amri, Maimuna Al-Maamari, Abrar Al-Habsi, Haitham Al-Maawali, Yaqzan Al-Balushi, Zayed Al-Jabri, Dalila Al-Dur'ai, Layla Ould Thani, Saeed Al-Wahaibi, and Tahani Al-Maamuli, translating into voice and image a story inspired by real events as a cry in the face of society to stop violence against women. This made the cinematic discourse in the film "Ash" a translation of both religious and humanitarian, and legal discourse.
The events of the film focus on a simple family consisting of a father, mother, son, and daughter, who becomes ill so they take her to the doctor, and in the waiting room, there's a mix-up in names between the daughter and another patient, both named "Fatima Salem." A confusion arises due to this similarity, and the results of the analysis are accidentally switched, and when the son goes to receive his sister's test results, he is shocked to learn from the analysis that she is pregnant, which incites his uproar and leads to an escalation.
The director chose the name "Ash" as the title of the film, which forms the initial threshold from which he launched, using a style of indefiniteness rather than definiteness, which, according to the science of semantics of significances, implies generality. Thus, the title meets its requirements as a general discourse that refers to its subject and serves its meaning. The problem does not pertain to a specific category or a specific group of women but concerns every woman exposed to violence, directing its message to every community that marginalizes women and does not acknowledge their rights, aiming to convey the message that the director wants to release from the cinema.
Why "Ash"?
The name "Ash" has multiple connotations that collectively give many meanings, such as referring to weakness and lack of cohesion, as it is a substance resulting from fire burning until it becomes fragile and easily scattered by the wind. Among its significations, it points to a foggy situation, unclear vision, or incomplete truth; the name is associated with injustice, depression, sadness, loss, loneliness, negativity, and defeatism, all of which pertain to the subject of the film, which went hand in hand with the director's treatment of the events. From a technical perspective, the director focused on the visual, scenic aspect as a parallel narrative, predominating over the narrative aspect, in an attempt to intensify the image and create excitement to involve the recipient in creating their own narrative, turning the spectator into a participant in the event instead of just a viewer or recipient, and the actors helped in this through the expertise in their roles using body language, gestures, hints, visual, sensory, and kinetic shifts. For instance, the scene of the father clenching his fingers strongly indicates determination and resolve based on an outburst of anger. The scene of Fatima passing by lovebirds before leaving and running her hand over the birdcage is enough to familiarize us with her character as a gentle, loving, calm, dreamy, kind girl.
