The new film “Mooz Lum” brought a 14-year-old girl at a Chicago viewing to tears because its scenes of harassment against Muslim students were all too familiar, says “Mooz Lum” screenwriter and director Qasim Basir. The girl told him she was often afraid to wear her hijab at school because of teasing and harassment.
“The point of making this film is to put a human face on Muslims and Islam,” says the filmmaker.
” Mooz Lum,” based on Basir’s life story, chronicles his upbringing in a strict Black Muslim family, studying to be a Qu’ranic scholar before transitioning to college life. Basir says the film’s title represents a mispronunciation of “Muslim” and conveys how misunderstood Islam is in the United States.
“These are people I know in my life,” says Basir of the film’s characters. The movie captures anti-Muslim sentiment on his college campus following the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks. Soon after the attacks, the FBI documented a 1,600 percent increased in hate crimes, according to the book Behind the Backlash: Muslim Americans After 9/11 by Dr. Lori Peek, an assistant professor of sociology at Colorado State University.
The country was not ready for a film like this shortly after Sept. 11, says “Mooz Lum” producer Dana Offenbach. Even today, with debate still swirling around the proposed Islamic community center near Ground Zero, emotions remain high.
