The Time That Remains

Made up of four significant episodes in Elia Suleiman’s family life, from 1948 to recent times, ‘The Time that remain’ is a partly autobiographical film, inspired by the personal notebooks of the director’s father, beginning when the latter fought in the resistance in 1948. It is also based on the letters his mother wrote to other members of her family who had been obliged to leave the country. Mixing her intimate memories of them and with them, the film portrays the daily life of these Palestinians who stayed in their native land and who were labelled ‘Arab-Israelis’, living as a minority in their own country.

“In this film, I really laid bare my soul ! I plunged into my most intimate self and my private life, with all the joys and sorrows that entails. I think that you need not to understand the film but to feel it, to get emotionally involved in it... When I saw my film, I was very touched by the scene where the whole family is gathered together in the kitchen. It’s not an attempt to seduce the spectator but to invite them, through the tiniest of intimate details, to delve into their own childhood. That was what I felt when I was watching the film, not when I was making it.” Elia Suleiman