JIHAD FOR LOVE, A
“All the people in my film are coming out as Muslims… They're proud to be gay… They're saying they're as Muslim as anybody else.” - filmmaker Parvez Sharma
Fourteen centuries since the holy Qur'an was penned, Islam is the world's second largest religion, and growing. Gay Muslim filmmaker Parvez Sharma travels the many worlds of this dynamic faith, discovering the tales of its most unlikely storytellers: lesbian and gay Muslims.
With homosexuality a crime under Islamic law, punishable by death, much of Sharma's filming takes place in secrecy. Shot over five years in 12 countries, Sharma's film seeks to reclaim the Islamic concept of a greater Jihad, which can mean ‘an inner struggle' or ‘to strive in the path of God', a welcome contrast to the narrow concept of ‘Jihad' as holy war.
D Parvez Sharma P Sandi DuBowski, Parvez Sharma WS Film Sales Company L Arabic, Turkish, Parsi, English, French, Hindi, Urdu w/English subtitles TD beta SP/2007/81mins