Name: USA vs Al-Arian
Genre: Documentary
Released: 2007-02-23
Duration: 1 h 40 min
Rating: 7.3
Cast: Abdullah Al-Arian, Laila Al-Arian, Lama Al-Arian

This is a documentary made by the Norwegian film maker Line Halvorsen, about the Palestinian professor Sami Al-Arian and his family with five children. The professor was arrested due to his pro Palestine speeches was wrongfully arrested accused of planning terrorism, spending more than two years in maximum security prison before his case was put up for trial in June 2006. Then together with 3 others which according to the accusations, should have contemplated terrorism, through financing it.

This film is a well made documentary by director Line Halvorsen, where we meet him and his family, where we see him fight the Palestinian case in a country where Israel has a wast influence in the government, the USA. USA has this way resisted more than 6.500 individuals after 9/11/2001 since the "Patriot act". Sami Al-Arian is one of this prisoners, arrested without trial. When his trial finally comes up, the fights the justice system of the most powerful country in the world, and their troubles with the freedom of speech, and paranoia due to fear of terrorism.

This is a balanced documentary, where we follow the case before it comes to court, and afterwards, hearing both sides, though it's obvious questions are the human rights and the very undemocratic Patriot act, forced through by the Bush- administration after 9/11. We get very close to brave and charmingly open family, and listen to arguments from both sides. We learn that the whole case was based on the taping of 472.000 phone calls during 9 years, of which only a few were used to establish the evidence.

We meet journalists which followed the half year long case every day, having troubles in understanding the proceeding of proofs against the professor. For those not knowing this story, I will not reveal the conviction, but we also meet the jurors after the trial. The FBI denied both being interviewed and some interviews of the professor.

A documentary which should really have some effect on every one watching. It's a shameful system witch allows violations of personal freedom in what's wrongfully called the biggest democracy in the world.

The film is almost like a long 60 minutes reportage, which out a narrative voice. I rarely have seen a documentary which wasn't biased when it comes to this, and maybe it's because of no use of narrative voice.

A must see for those who are interesting in democracy and the effects of the Patriot act.

The documentary is a form of non-fiction storytelling that aims to present factual information, insights, and perspectives on real-world subjects, events, issues, or people. Documentaries can cover a wide range of topics, including history, science, culture, social issues, nature, biographies, and more.

Dziga Vertov in Man with a Movie Camera (1929)

USA vs AL-ARIAN is a close portrait of an Arab-American family facing terrorism charges leveled by the U.S. Government. The film shows a personal story of a family living in a society where fear of terrorism has resulted in increasing stigmatization and discrimination against Muslims.

The Biggest Movies and TV Coming in September

See which big screen releases you can watch from the comfort of your couch.

Theatrical Releases Coming to Streaming

Get a closer look at these actors from their many TV and streaming series roles.

USA vs Al-Arian

Photos1

Top Cast6

User reviews1

Related interests

Storyline

Top picks

Details

Box office

Tech specs

Contribute to this page

More to explore

Recently viewed