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Mosque pitTaqwacore: The Birth of Punk Islam tells |
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 SHOT BY BOTH SIDES: The Kominas By MALCOLM FRASER “I would be lying if I said I wasn’t a little nervous about some of the response one might expect from this film,” admits Omar Majeed as he prepares for the premiere of his new documentary, Taqwacore: The Birth of Punk Islam. “Taqwa” is the Arabic word for religious consciousness, and the mash-up of Islam and punk rock the film shows is just as surprising, contradictory and controversial as one might expect. “Muslims are very sensitive nowadays, and sometimes they can overreact to perceived slurs against their culture and their religion,” says Majeed. “And at the same time I’m nervous about the Muslim reaction, I’m nervous about non- Muslims not getting it.” But although the film certainly has the potential to piss off and perplex, Majeed—a former Toronto TV documentarian who also put in a brief stint as a Mirror film critic upon moving here—has woven together a fascinating story that’s as profound as it is provocative. The film’s main character is Michael Muhammad Knight, a young white Catholic-raised American who converted to Islam as a teenager and went on to write a novel entitled The Taqwacores. Though his vision of an Islamic punk scene was entirely fictional, he soon found himself corresponding with other young people around North America who identified with his imagined community— notably the Kominas, a Boston-based punk band fronted by two young Muslims, Basim Usmani and Shahjehan Khan, who straddle the two worlds with occasional unease. It was around this time that Majeed came on board. Reached by e-mail, Knight recalls, “Omar was originally going to do a project on North American Muslims, basically with a bunch of talking heads working out issues. I was approached as one of those talking heads, and told him the story of taqwacore. And that pushed out all the academics and TV commentators. We became the story.” The camera-ready Knight sees commonalities between the two cultures he bridges: “We tend to imagine both as clear categories, and they’re both much more complicated than we ever imagine,” he says. “Both punk and Islam stand for being yourself, and never compromising— which, I guess, isn’t always a good thing. But it’s a good virtue to whip out sometimes.” TAQWA TOURIn the first part of the film, Knight organizes a taqwacore tour of the U.S., bringing the Kominas, Vancouver-based Islamic riot-grrl trio Secret Trial Five, and a shapeshifting crew on the road. After documenting this Islamic twist on the typical hijinks and humiliations of the road, the chapter climaxes with an appearance at ISNA, an Islamic conference in Chicago, where the taqwacores bum-rush an open mic night for Muslim teens. In true punk-rock fashion, the bands enrage the authorities and get thrown off the stage, but not before blowing a few young minds. “Andy Kaufman would antagonize the audience, but in such a way that stretched the possibilities of what could happen onstage,” says Knight by way of comparison. “At the ISNA convention, it was a similar experiment: going into an environment where of course we would fail, and choosing to fail big, hoping that there would end up being a point to all of it. And of course, there was a point.” By giving what one band member aptly describes as “a middle finger in both directions” to anti-Muslim prejudice and conservative Islam, the film and its subjects argue for a more individualized approach to the faith, a notion that Majeed admits is at an early stage. “Everyone who’s involved in taqwacore is aware that they’re building something,” he says. “To some extent, the reason I called the film The Birth of Punk Islam is because I saw this whole process as a kind of birthing. It wasn’t just that this was happening and I was filming it, but rather that by my being there and filming it, we managed to give birth to this thing. I think that kind of shows in the filmmaking, the way it’s put together. I’m not always rushing to get the other side of things, I’m not looking to be journalistic or fair and balanced. I’m really trying to tell their story in a way that I find relatable.
PILGRIMS’ PROGRESSThe film’s second half is even more interesting, as Knight, Khan and Usmani travel to Pakistan, where their efforts to bring politicized rock to the people encounters a whole different form of opposition. “Whatever our issues are in North America with how we’re perceived and identity politics and stuff,” says Majeed, “there is still the ability to be very vocal in your dissent. You might not be appreciated for it—people might misunderstand you or misinterpret you— but you’re free to go ahead and say ‘Fuck Bush, fuck the government,’ or ‘This is all bullshit, you’re stereotyping Muslims,’ whatever. In Pakistan, the society is a little more rigid, and there are still things that are quite taboo. “And so it was a really interesting place to bring something like taqwacore, because it felt like we were smuggling something in. We ourselves are contraband, just being there… there were areas in which we kind of had to walk a fine line. But in some ways, it also brought out the struggle of taqwacore in a way that was more real. If we could make something happen there, this thing could really lay down some roots and develop.” The challenges and contradictions that the taqwacores face in each culture are woven in with some deeply affecting personal journeys, resulting in a film that opens your mind and stays with you long after viewing. “The documentary offers a chance to really ‘get’ taqwacore, what it is and what it is not,” says Knight. “Some say that we’re not Muslim enough, and some say that we’re not punk enough. But labels aren’t cool; people are cool. People make a lot of assumptions about us based on the ‘Muslim punk’ label, and the film smashes them down.” TAQWACORE: THE BIRTH OF PUNK ISLAM PREMIERES
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