Dylan Bergeson
Seattle-based documentary filmmaker Dylan Bergeson began work on what would become This Body Is A Prison while still a student majoring in Media Literacy and Palestine Studies at Fairhaven College in Bellingham, Wash.
It started with a trip to the West Bank in 2004. After that experience, Bergeson – whose media background to that point had been primarily print journalism – decided to make a movie about the Palestinian experience of living under occupation. He returned to the Middle East in December 2005, eventually crossing over to the West Bank, where he would live and work until April 2006.
“I basically learned how to make a movie while I was doing it,” Bergeson said. “I think I was getting dissatisfied with the limits of writing for print. It’s harder to get the full weight of a message across when you’re just working in words.”
Rather than setting out with an agenda – or even a plan – Bergeson arrived with his equipment and a commitment to look and listen. He first thought he might focus his lens on mental health clinics, but as the weeks wore on he discovered that the documentary he really wanted to make was about the children he met, many of whom were themselves the children of parents who grew up under occupation.
This Body is a Prison portrays a society that has been psychologically reshaped by decades of tension. “ "When I was living in Balata Refugee Camp, people would say things like, ‘I could wake up for the last time tomorrow,’ or “I could lose my whole family today.’ It’s very difficult for people to live life that way. It’s hard to plan for the future like that, knowing that no matter how much education you get, you’re probably going to die in a hole like everybody else.”
Children reflect these attitudes from an early age. “They’ll play Israelis and Palestinians. The kids who are the ‘Israelis’ will beat up on a kid, and if he takes it well, he gets respect. It’s all very strange, but they’re acting out their environment.”
In the hands of most mass-media outlets, these observations become politicized payloads, weapons in the battle for world opinion. But not This Body is a Prison. “I definitely identify as pro-Palestinian, but I don’t see that as contrary to being pro-Israeli,” Bergeson said. “I care a lot more about the people on both sides who are kind of victims to this political situation. "Israel's ongoing colonization of Palestinian land is the basic barrier to peace for both peoples. Justice and reconciliation for the decades-long occupation are prerequisites for a lasting peace.”
Mitchell Davis, who got to know Bergeson after the filmmaker met Farrah Hoffmire in New Orleans, was impressed by the film’s open, honest humanity.
“It simply says, ‘I am one person witnessing a real-life situation and depicting how it affects the human beings least likely to rationalize it into having meaning – children,’” Davis said. “Every side of every violent political conflict has a similar story line and this is just one. We chose this film because it is brave, solo-journalistic storytelling, showing us images that are not easy to watch, but that tell an important perspective on violence of any sort.”