Incendies - Love and War

Incendies * * *

Incendies' Beginning

The mother was forced to temporarily abandon her son when her family rejected her secret marriage and pregnancy by a Muslim Palestinian refugee before the Lebanese Civil War. The son was placed in an orphanage before later being recruited by the Lebanese Christian Right to fight against the Palestinians. In parallel, the daughter leaves Canada -where the mother lived and raised her two children- just as the mother’s journey into the past begins in search of her son. When the Christian Right shuts down the university, halting her studies, the mother returns to the orphanage only to discover what happened to her son and the other children. Later, while riding a bus carrying Palestinian refugees, they are intercepted by armed Christian Right militiamen who mercilessly slaughter everyone, including women and children. Nawal only survives by telling them she is a Christian like them.

Incendies' Mid-point

In the middle of Incendies, where the plot takes a sharp turn, the mother undergoes a profound transformation. She decides to take revenge on the nationalists, assassinating the leader of a Christian militia. Consequently, she is arrested and subjected to rape in prison. We later discover that her twins are the children of her torturer and rapist, and that this torturer and rapist was the son she was searching for! The son had raped his mother in prison, completely unaware of her identity. After leaving Palestinian control, he had worked for the Lebanese nationalists in that prison, driven by his own desire to find his mother.

Incendies' Climax

The mother was released from prison and cared for the two children despite everything that had happened. She neither hated them nor punished them for the trauma she endured. Her daughter, Jane, in particular, grew up to be a noble, mature, and sensitive person. Because of this, the daughter was the most committed to fulfilling her mother’s will: searching for the brother and the father, whom they ultimately discovered were the exact same person. From this point, the film highlights the stark contrast between love and war. War turned the son into an antagonist to the protagonist -his mother- and made him a father to his own siblings; war created severe distortions and tragic atrocities. In contrast, the mother armed herself with love. She loved a Muslim Palestinian, conceived a child out of love, and despite all the agony she endured throughout her life, she managed -through love- to raise her two children, who were born out of rape and oppression.

Incendies' Finale

Most importantly, through love -which Nawal repeatedly mentioned in her letter to her son- she managed to change her antagonist. The best protagonists in drama are those who alter their antagonists. In the final scene, we see the antagonist standing before the protagonist’s grave, surrounded by the greenery of love that triumphed over war. War, despite being waged with the power of weapons and bombs, could never achieve such an impact. More importantly, that war was fought in the name of God. It is as if Incendies teaches us how to truly know God; His existence was proven through mathematics, and likewise through drama, by making the protagonist change the antagonist. The fact that the antagonist is simultaneously the son and the father mirrors Christian theological thought about God, while concurrently addressing Islamic faith. It is the same entity in all cases, and it does not matter how we perceive it or how we worship it. It is love. It came from love, and despite all the wars, love was born.

Finished.

Read Inner Voice

Follow us on Facebook and Instagram

Contact us on WhatsApp