Hiam abbass

Hiam Abbass was born in Nazareth, Israel, on November 30, 1960. Very proud of her origins, this dark-haired, very Mediterranean actress, whose face has very marked lines and a very special smile, says she feels “that I belong everywhere of the world. Of course, my roots are Palestinian, it is my blood, my country. But I have always been more interested in things that are not seen, than those that I see, it is something that has led me all my life. That is why I am not surprised, seeing my career, that I have traveled so much around the world, to London, to Paris… It goes with my way of being, it is very enriching and I like it.”

Hiam grew up in a Muslim town near the Lebanese border. Although her parents are Muslim, she does not consider herself particularly attached to Islam. And she scandalized the neighbors when she refused to marry the cousin who seemed destined to be her husband, and because of other customs such as smoking. In addition, a restless woman, she Hiam attended the university, and studied theater and photography. And she had the advantage of being fluent in four languages: Hebrew, Arabic, French and English.

The drama of the Middle East, with families separated by conflicts, touches him closely, since he has family in countries that are not very friendly to Israel, such as Syria. In fact, the difficult situation led him to move to Paris in 2002, he had to move to France if he wanted to succeed in the world of acting. And his first film work would be in that country, in films like Each one looks for his cat (1996). She went from small roles to more substantial ones, but always as an Arab woman, the titles L’ange de goudron (2000) or Red Satin (2002) are there to corroborate it. Together with Gérard Depardieu , she would make Aime ton père (2002), but the film that began to make her recognizable to the public wasThe Syrian Bride (2004), where she was directed by the Jewish filmmaker Eran Riklis , who four years later would give her her most memorable role in The Lemon Trees(2008). The first film captures the identity problems that arise when a wedding is going to be held, and the other talks about an absurd conflict that forces them to uproot some lemon trees, it is a security problem. Her work with Riklis is a measure of the broad-mindedness of the actress and director, and offers hope that the problems in the area will one day be fixed. As Hiam told me, “I think above all of young people, of children, the future that we are giving them. I have the feeling that this generation and the next two are going to be deeply marked by this, they will be lost generations, which will have been fed by hatred. I try to play my role, commit myself at different levels, not only with films that deal with these realities, but in other ways,

The problem of Islamic suicide terrorism is well present in Paradise Now (2005), by an Arab director, Hany Abu-Assad , nominated for an Oscar; and another look at border problems is present in Free Zone , with Israeli director, Amos Gitai , and shot the same year as the other film. Although neither of the two films took him to the United States to shoot, they were Hollywood productions, which allowed him to test the cinema that reaches audiences around the world. I am referring to Munich (2005), where Steven Spielberg addressed the 1972 Olympic Games bombings, and Natividad (2006), a film that followed in the wake of The Passion of the Christ., when addressing the birth of Jesus; the actress had the role of Ana, the mother of the Virgin Mary.

Conversations with my gardener (2007) brought him back to French cinema at the hands of Jean Becker , a filmmaker especially gifted at creating moving human situations. Situations where Hiam is comfortable, and that allow him to embody interesting characters. Like the one in The Visitor (2007), magnificent, where the actress far exceeds the handicap of appearing halfway through; Hiam combines well the concern of a mother, with a subtle autumnal love story.

There is no lack of work for this character actress, as evidenced by the eight titles in which she participated in 2008, and the six she has for 2009. For example, Jim Jarmusch has noticed her for Limits of Control .