When writer-director Weam Namou started crafting POMEGRANATE, she wasn’t simply making a movie—she was planting a flag. The primary Iraqi-American narrative function led by Iraqi creatives, the film dives headfirst into the tensions between Muslim and Christian Iraqis residing facet by facet in suburban Michigan throughout the explosive 2016 U.S. election. However its actual topic is much extra intimate: id, womanhood, and the associated fee—and energy—of reclaiming your voice.
“This movie is greater than a film; it’s an announcement,” Namou declares. “A step towards redefining how our tales are seen and instructed within the broader cultural panorama.”
📍 Setting: Little Baghdad, 2016
The story facilities on Niran, a 20-year-old Iraqi Muslim refugee, and her difficult relationship with Mary, her MAGA-sign-wielding Christian Iraqi neighbor. However beneath the humor and cultural stress lies a daring political act.
“The 2016 elections created deep divisions throughout the U.S., however nowhere was it extra palpable than Michigan,” Namou explains. “This isn’t fiction for me. What I witnessed felt painfully acquainted—like Iraq, the place democracy didn’t exist.”
Selecting storytelling over on-line rants, Namou channeled frustration into creativity. POMEGRANATE turned her response to each trendy polarization and historic silencing.
✍️ The Spirit of Enheduanna Lives On
The movie’s protagonist, Niran, attracts inspiration from Enheduanna, the world’s first recorded writer and priestess of Historic Mesopotamia.
“Enheduanna claimed authorship 1000’s of years in the past in a society that revered each female and male deities. That legacy was buried—however not erased,” Namou says.
“Niran desires of being a contemporary Enheduanna. That’s the guts of this movie: reclaiming id, one phrase at a time.”
🎬 From Resistance to Resilience
Namou’s refusal to evolve to Hollywood stereotypes wasn’t with out value. Nevertheless it’s additionally what made POMEGRANATE groundbreaking.
“As an writer, I used to be instructed I needed to write about honor killings to promote books. As a filmmaker, I used to be instructed my tales have been too area of interest,” she recollects. “However I refused to promote out.”
As an alternative, she made historical past—POMEGRANATE has received over 40 worldwide awards and is now streaming in 25 international locations.
💥 Religion, Vogue, and Fearlessness
One of many movie’s sharpest subversions is its portrayal of Niran: hijabi, trendy, daring, and politically engaged.
“I grew up round Muslim girls like Niran,” Namou says. “The Western media solely tells one story—the abused girl operating from her household. That’s not simply false. It’s lazy.”
She recounts visiting a Heathrow bookstore within the ’90s and seeing each guide on Center Japanese girls penned by Westerners: veils, abuse, silence. That second lit a hearth.
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“I vowed then to inform genuine tales of my group. Tales about girls who’re dynamic, complicated, and highly effective.”
🎥 Behind the Scenes: Actual Folks, Actual Stakes
From casting to crewing, authenticity was paramount. Actual Muslim Iraqis play the Muslim household. Actual Chaldeans play the Christian one.
“Samya Rahmani, who performs Niran, really reached out to me immediately along with her reel,” Namou recollects. “She had the braveness and depth I wanted.”
Zain Shami, a hijabi comic, was forged as Hassina—a task impressed by famed Iraqi actress Amal Taha. Even Mary was forged from inside Namou’s personal group—her cousin Natally auditioned after casually styling Namou’s daughter’s hair.
Thriller sparks change
“It was a grassroots miracle,” she says.
🧠 Mentorship from “Dwelling Alone”
Govt Producer Scott Rosenfelt (sure, of Dwelling Alone and Mystic Pizza) was key in lifting the mission off the bottom.
“He instructed me tales of the chaos on these units and reassured me that I’d survive mine,” Namou laughs. “His calm within the storm gave me the boldness to maintain going.”
🏛️ A Historic First… and a Cultural Lightning Rod
POMEGRANATE hasn’t simply been applauded—it’s sparked controversy. Some interfaith teams and Arabic organizations declined to display it, afraid of its frankness round subjects just like the hijab and assimilation.
“This movie removes the masks. It speaks the unspeakable, which is why it has ruffled feathers,” she says. “However like Francis Ford Coppola mentioned of The Godfather—if persons are upset, the story might be price telling.”
💬 A Movie That Begins Conversations
Namou says essentially the most transferring responses have come from unlikely locations: a scholar on the U.S. Naval Academy, a half-Italian, half-Palestinian lady in Michigan, and a annoyed Iraqi scholar within the Netherlands who couldn’t entry the movie.
“POMEGRANATE resonates as a result of it tells a human story first. One which transcends geography, faith, and politics.”
🧕🏽 Ladies’s Historical past Month and the Battle for Company
Launched throughout Ladies’s Historical past Month, the movie takes on even deeper significance.
“POMEGRANATE is about any girl—Center Japanese or not—who’s struggled to search out her voice in opposition to cultural or private limitations,” Namou shares. “It’s a love letter to independence.”
🧭 What’s Subsequent? Maintain Going.
When requested what Enheduanna may say about this movie, Namou doesn’t hesitate:
“I think about her smiling and saying, ‘Thanks. The work isn’t completed—maintain going.’”
And what does Namou hope audiences stroll away with?
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“Laughter. Questions. And actual conversations—about religion, the hijab, the immigrant expertise, and the way we are able to embrace American life with out erasing who we’re.”
🎞️ Watch the Movie
POMEGRANATE is now out there on digital HD platforms worldwide by way of Freestyle Digital Media. 📺 Watch the trailer 🎬 Official website 📸 Nonetheless photographs and poster
“Filmmakers from marginalized communities carry a duty: inform the reality. And maintain telling it till it’s inconceivable to disregard.” – Weam Namou
POMEGRANATE isn’t only a movie. It’s a motion. And it’s solely simply begun.