Vittorio Carli's Interview with Usama Alshaibi, director of "Nice Bombs"

The acclaimed Chicago film maker, Usama Alshaibi, recently went back to his birth place in Iraq with his wife Kristie, to do the documentary "Nice Bombs," on the conflict there. The powerful film captures the views of ordinary Iraqi citizens, and we get to know them as human beings. The film is clearly a labor of love for him.  It was executive produced by Chicago author, Studs Terkel, and Usama's wife Kristie (who sometimes goes by the name Art Vamp and Echo Transgression) was the producer. Previously, Alshaibi was also the founder and director of the the notorious Z Festival. His wonderfully subversive and transgressive shorts somehow manage to make ugliness beautiful. They are completely unlike anything I have ever seen, and as a film critic I can't say that very often (I saw a screening at the Odd Obsession video store). His music videos are just as creative and unique. I picked his video for the band Magic is Küntmaster (featuring Camille Ha) as the best Chicago music video in my 2004 Best of the Year column for reelmoviecritic.com. "Nice Bombs" will premier at the opening night in this year's Chicago Underground Film Festival on August 17 at 8 p.m. at the Music Box Theater. Despite his busy schedule, Alshaibi graciously agreed to let me do a lengthy interview with him on the phone.

VC: Can you tell me about your childhood?

UA: I was born in Bagdad, which is located in the middle of Iraq. I came to the USA when I was four years old, and I attended kindergarten in America. I only recently became a US citizen.

VC: Was there much cultural adjustment involved and did you encounter much anti-Arab bias?

UA: Well, we kept moving around, going back and forth.  There were a fair amount of Arabs in Iowa, but Iraq was not in the news often the way it is today, so hardly any one in Iowa even knew where Iraq was. We were seen as odd. People stared at us at Wal-mart, but they were pretty friendly overall.

VC: How did your film career begin?

UA: When I was young I painted. Then I slowly got into photography. I went to Columbia College, and my main focuses were editing and making documentaries. But Columbia's film department was mostly interested in the mainstream, and I mostly was interested in experimental films. Some of my experimental features made it into the New York Underground Film Festival and the Chicago Underground Film Festival. I’ve shot in 8 millimeter, but I like the flexibility that shooting on video gives me.

VC: What were some of the underground film makers that you admired that influenced you?

UA: Well, I always loved Jack Smith's work, "Flaming Creatures." I also admire Richard Kern, the early documentaries of Errol Morris and Luis Bunuel's surrealist works I mostly felt an affinity with the so-called transgressive film makers like Kern, and Nick Zedd. I also followed Jack Sargeant's work, and I especially admire his book, "Death Tripping: Cinema of Transgression." Sargeant wrote about my film work. Despite my admiration for these figures, I don't want to do work that is similar to anyone else's.

VC: Can you tell me about the videos?

UA: Well, I had known the musician, Camilla Ha for awhile, and I liked the song, so I ended up doing the Magic is Küntmaster video.  I used a larger flash light on the video. I also did videos for Bobby Conn and Panicsville. I had known many noise musicians, and I had them play at the Z Festivals, and I ended up doing their videos.

VC: Can you tell me about Art Vamp?

UA: It's a project my wife started, and then I got involved in 2003. We produce stuff including her films, we edit, and we do web sites.

VC: I knew one of your collaborators, the Polish born filmmaker/actor, Piotri Tokarski when he lived in Pilsen, and he seemed pretty completely crazy but friendly.  I once saw him get so drunk at a party that he fell off a roof and spent a month in the hospital.  What was he like to work with?

UA: Well, we went to Columbia College together. In the late '90s, we made some sleazy short videos together, but they weren't really porn.  He was also the star of my feature, "Muhammad and Jane." He ended up dropping out of the film industry, and moving to Arizona.  I knew him when he wasn't a drunk. He was a sweet, talented and unusual guy, and I liked working with him.  We worked together well and he only trusted me enough to let me direct him.

VC: I saw some of your photos with Kristie and Josi Madera. Can you tell me about them?

 UA: Well those photos deal with disfiguration, which I have always been fascinated with. Like the surrealists, I wanted to change the way people look at art and the human body, and make people rethink what is holy or metaphysical.

VC:   Is there a philosophy behind your filmmaking?

UA: Well, I always try to go against what is expected or my natural impulses.  I try to create anxiety.  I like to explore dark complex characters and go beyond good and evil.

 VC:  What can you tell me about "Nice Bombs?"

UA: Well, I was working with Studs Terkel at the  Chicago Historical Museum, and I told him I wanted to go back to Bagdad and shoot a movie.  He encouraged me and gave me money for it, and at the time I was broke.  My father who lives in Jordan also wanted to be involved. But every time Kristie and I wanted to leave, a bomb would go off and we would change out minds. We were aware there was a high level of danger and risk, but we wanted to do it anyway. The film was a natural progression in my work, and I had been building up to it.  It's more accessible than anything I have ever done, and people from Iowa to Bagdad can relate to it.  The film also brought me back to my childhood, and it was a bittersweet experience, seeing my family and how the war affected them. Ordinary Iraqis are clearly being punished for the crimes of a madman.

VC: Do you think the US is in it for oil?

UA: I think we invaded for strategic interests, but it was ill planned and we underestimated what was happening. On the positive side they took out Sadam, but everything is screwed up there now.  Now we (the USA) will probably be there for 10 years.

VC: What do you think about the way that the US media is presenting the conflict?

UA: I think we are mostly getting the US Military's view. The whole thing is shown in an inhumane way, and they leave out all the moral ambiguity. America is now seen throughout the world as a big, dumb child that sees everything in black and white.

 VC:  What do you have planned for the future?

UA: I am going to do a kind of a sequel to "Nice Bombs" called "Bagdad Iowa" which gives the viewpoint on the whole thing from people in Iowa. I am still in preproduction and I am trying to get funding.