Filmmaker and UC Merced Professor Yehuda Sharim recently completed an autobiographical project that is an intimate contemplation of his childhood home in Israel, where visits with his aging father are juxtaposed with the conflict and violence engulfing the Middle East.
“I don’t recognize the country of my birth, and it does not recognize me,” Sharim said, describing the experiences documented in “Who but When, How.”
“There, I visit my father, who cannot remember my name. They are both changing forever, disappearing, refusing to be embraced.”
Sharim, a professor of media and performance studies, said he hopes the film can help Muslim and Jewish people in Israel and the Palestinian territories find common ground to share their feelings of loss.
“Here cinema does what governments and army generals cannot foresee – creating a meeting space for deep listening, understanding and compassion in a world bleaker with each passing day,” he said.
