Natalie D.C.
A groundbreaking experimental documentary by Lebanese writer and director Heiny Srour, Leila and the Wolves (1985) was recently digitally restored by the French National Centre of Cinema (CNC) and re-released by BAM Cinemas and distributor Several Futures in select U.S. and Canadian theaters for the first time ever in celebration of the film’s 40th anniversary.
In 2025, the genre-defying film is both eerie and awe-inspiring as it tells the harrowing stories of Palestinian and Lebanese women as they fought—and still fight—for liberation.
Heiny Srour is known for her bold depictions of women’s unseen roles during forgotten conflicts. After all, she was the first Arab woman to have her documentary, The Hour of Liberation Has Arrived, selected to be featured at the Cannes Film Festival in 1974. This film, like Leila and the Wolves, weaves theatrical elements with all-too-real testimonials from women at the heart of a brutal conflict (in this case, Omani women in colonized Dhofar).
Leila and the Wolves, which premiered ten years later at the 1984 Venice International Film Festival, follows Leila (played by Nabila Zeitouni), a Lebanese woman living in 1980s London who is organizing an art exhibition displaying photography from revolutionary moments in Palestinian and Lebanese history. When she notices that none of the photographs depict women—a fact her boyfriend (played by Rafik Ali Ahmad) flippantly dismisses with “In those days, women had nothing to do with politics”—Leila goes on a journey through space and time to discover the forgotten contributions of women leading up to and in the aftermath of the violent creation of the state of Israel, also known as the Nakba.
Zeitouni’s character morphs throughout the film, filling the roles of various women throughout the non-chronological moments of history that Leila visits. In one scene, Leila is an overworked housewife cooking for her soldier husband and his fellow men. Then, the scene morphs and Leila is suddenly in her London apartment, her boyfriend lazily asking what’s for dinner. This parallel is drawn multiple times throughout the film, not only allowing Leila to act as a stand-in for an uninformed viewer, but also demonstrating how misogyny has evolved throughout the decades. The film makes it clear that just because Leila is looking in on these women’s lives does not mean she is any safer from the clutches of patriarchy.
Throughout the film, Leila wears a white dress, floating through fantastical reenacted scenes from Palestinian and Lebanese women’s everyday lives like a ghost. In fact, in spite of its fairy-tale-like style, Leila and the Wolves is full of ghosts. From bloodied men in combat to determined women fighting for liberation–not only from their colonizers, but also from their misogynist communities–it is made clear to the viewer, no matter how familiar they may be with the subject matter, that almost everyone in this film as of the present-day, save for Leila herself, is dead at the hands of patriarchy and imperialism.
This hard-to-swallow fact is exactly what makes this film so enrapturing. Using circular panning shots, Heiny Srour expertly directs the viewers’ eyes towards the stifling horrors that the depicted women must face head-on—from abusive husbands to extreme poverty to destroyed villages. These scenes are gorgeously captured by cinematographers Charley Recors and Curtis Clark as stills of sheer destruction are juxtaposed against the natural beauty of Palestine’s and Lebanon’s mountains, skies, and seas, which have not yet been touched by the claws of Zionism–or, as the film deems them, “wolves.”
One scene like this appears multiple times throughout Leila’s journey. At different points in the film, the young protagonist finds herself on a beach surrounded by other women covered head-to-toe in black. Not too far away, a group of men—from boys to adults—play in the water, their bodies exposed to the elements, free. This is a defining moment of the film that confirms Leila’s suspicions: women are the unseen heroines of Palestinian and Lebanese resistance against apartheid and colonization.
Despite their invisibility and the social, financial, and political hurdles put in place by allies and enemies alike, these women find ways to aid the revolution. Whether it’s smuggling weapons in baskets of flour, trading secrets under the guise of a looming wedding, or throwing flower pots from balconies at unsuspecting armed forces, the women of Palestine and Lebanon use performed acts of femininity to aid their liberation.
These reenacted scenes based on true events from the time period work seamlessly alongside spliced pre- and post-World War II archival footage, thanks to the careful efforts of editor Eva Houdova. Not only does this stylistic choice provide context for a Western audience, but it also makes this film genre-defying as it proves itself as more than a simple documentary. Rather, it creatively dramaticizes untold stories of women living in one of the most vulnerable regions in the world, all within a frame narrative whose somber protagonist desperately attempts to remember and reclaim these moments lost to history.
Music plays a vital role in grounding the viewer within pre- and post-colonial Palestine and Lebanon. The soundtrack, created by beloved Lebanese composer and singer Zaki Nassif, echoes in the viewer’s head long after the film draws to a close.
Another mainstay of Leila and the Wolves are juxtapositions. Specifically, the contrasts drawn between the women determined to fight and the men who shun their efforts are at the heart of the film’s feminist messaging situated within a tumultuous period of history.
Because the film has a consistent, neutral color palette, Srour’s use of color plays a noticeable role in a particular juxtaposition. While the film’s use of black and white costuming (like in the beach scene described above) often symbolizes life and death (Leila is of the living, floating through the lives of the dead), there is one scene that boldly defies this unspoken rule.
Towards the end of the film, there is a reenactment of soldiers violently raiding a Palestinian village in what is most likely a depiction of the many horrors executed during the 1948 Nakba (or “Catastrophe” in Arabic) which saw the ethnic cleansing of over 750,000 Palestinians from their native land. In the scene, the villagers wear white, while the raiders wear black. Since most–if not all–of the villagers are murdered in cold blood by the end of the scene, it stands to reason that this contrast of black and white could represent the bold contrast between the victimized colonized and the vicious colonizers, a juxtaposition that is arguably the most important of the film as it demonstrates the depicted women’s true need for liberation.
Leila and the Wolves is a must-watch for any and all fans of feminist world cinema, regardless of their knowledge on the topic of Palestinian and Lebanese resistance or their familiarity with the documentary genre as a whole. Because of this film’s genre-bending nature–its incorporation of archival footage grounding the nonlinear narrative and its dramatic elements lifting the story to new heights–almost anyone is able to put themselves in the shoes of Leila as she visits women of the past whose stories have been washed away by history.
This accessibility is vital in a time when thousands of Palestinian women and children have been killed during Israel’s relentless siege on Gaza. It is important, now more than ever, that people from all over the world—especially Westerners—recognize what Palestinian and Lebanese women have been and are currently being put through.
In the words of Heiny Srour herself, “I am so delighted to meet my American public. My films are a bridge of peace, and that’s what we need right now.” She goes on to thank the film’s distributor Several Futures: “Without [them], the wolves would have eaten Leila.” This quote emphasizes that Palestinian and Lebanese women deserve to have their stories told, lest this history is devoured by patriarchal and imperialist forces. In Leila and the Wolves, Heiny Srour does this and so much more, contextualizing, retelling, and reimagining a little-known, yet brutal history.
