Muslim Cinema

This chapter proposes the analytical category “Muslim cinema” as a framework for studying how interpretations of Muslim subjectivity affect the production and interpretation of film. It attempts to establish a clear, but malleable definitional domain for comparative film analysis of global cinematic Muslim self-representation. To demonstrate its methodological utility, much of the essay outlines the contours of Muslim cinema in North America through focused readings of key films, including immigrant stories, third culture experiences of 2nd- or 3rd-generation Muslims in America, queer Muslim accounts, Black Muslim life in the US, and diaspora tales reimagining ancestral homelands. It also argues that vital to scholarship on Muslims in film is analysis of the economic, social, and political infrastructure that either enables or prohibits its proliferation, including exploration of funding and philanthropy, mentorship and professionalization efforts, exhibition and recognition, and the impact of celebrities. The chapter concludes with a discussion of scholarship on global Muslim cinema, including key Muslim majority national film industries, such as Iran, Egypt, Türkiye, and Indonesia, with the hopes of encouraging a more sustained and comprehensive focus on Muslim subjectivity within the study of film in these geographies and cultures.