Are we up to taking "imagination" seriously?

“It’s a different way of making films and I haven’t invented that. There has to be some space for that in Egypt. It’s about time, I think.

So here I am reading an article in Egypt Today’s last month edition (July) and they’re discussing the choice made by the director of the recently released movie, Ein Shams; Ibrahim Batout, to not have an actual script. (http://www.egypttoday.com/article.aspx?ArticleID=8099) As a consequence of his choice, the Egyptian Censorship Bureau could not allow it to be aired in Egypt citing the reason that it “isn’t Egyptian enough” as a means to bar the filming from showing in Egypt.

In the section titled “Everywhere Except Egypt” in the article written by Manal al Jesri, she quotes Batout saying that “They do not want a wave of films they cannot control. Because in the end it is all about control. They are controlling what you eat, what you see and what you hear.” A very foucauldian notion at first, it comes off to me. Issues of discipline disappear when you present yout artistic form to a bureau that relies on disciplining through textual language. The Egyptian Censorship Bureau requires that for texts to be approved to the public, they must be screened at the Bureau and altered if need be or not admitted at all. Which, in a place where when things go wrong the government’s role in it is always called into question (usually for the worse), I myself see why they would do it.

I can’t say however that even if I see why the Egyptian state would establish such an office to censor movies to ensure their safety in the public’s eyes I can support such an idea. Such an explanation sounds like the easiest way to think of solving an obstacle in your way. If this was the road to freedom, why do we always choose to take the safest, learn original or creative, initiative just to make sure they we don’t have them “hurting our heads.”

States have had to struggle with issues of control for a long time now. Now I can’t say that I know of exact examples where more creative issues have come up. At least not from real research. But I don’t think that should stop us from identifying the limits on creativity that the establishment of such a bureau could have on the future of cinema or other art forms. Even with conservative populations there are always strategies that are tactfully used to ensure the spaces for artists to ensue their creativity.

One of the problems I feel that arise is that the “public” this theoretically popular and abstract term gets used to usually mean the “normal lay man” who apparently to many people usually means ignorant, angry, short-sighted, and uneasy to satisfy. Such a conception of your public is popular from everyone to say these days; the government, its opponents, and even independents.

But how exactly does one’s conception of the public tie in with the limit of creativity? The way I see it is that in situations of crisis, like this one, (well it’s not a crisis, but I can’t see a better word) those that attempt to control prioritize the “public reaction” and “public moral” (two commonly used terms from newspapers to litigation that mean absolutely anything and nothing at the same time) get invoked to censor and limit an artist’s creativity. It goes something like the government is afraid of angering so we won’t take a risk on it.

Such a hypothetical process (again, I don’t have real research, I’m just thinking out loud) happens at the expense of artists, who are the producers of this form. Call me a little liberal or crazy (both are starting to mean the same thing anyway) but I feel that the main decision-makers in the content of an art form should be the one’s producing it. It helps us target our criticism in more focused and precise ways if we know how comes out with the content. The more and more people intervene in the artist form, the more ruptures appear in the cinema for me as a consumer that I myself always have trouble watching Arabic movies because I feel there’s too much tension and “cut up” scenes that I realize I can’t even begin to sift through the multiple (unnecessary) layers that went into the production of the film (meaning that I’m aware that ‘behind the scenes’ changes were made against the producers or directors will).

This is why I admire the comments made by Ibrahim Battout in Egypt Today. He said, on making a film without a script: “It’s a different way of making films and I haven’t invented that. There has to be some space for that in Egypt. It’s about time, I think.

Law-makers, as well as the public, who should be responsible for making sure their laws are fair, human, and allow for imagination of their society should let those who produce theses artistic forms more of a chance. The bureau needs to ensure that if they don’t close down, they at least ensure that the constant desire for creativity is always one of the priorities in their establishment.