Chou Sar? (What happened?) is a documentary film

by De Gaulle Eid, made in 2010 in Lebanon. The

film consists of a number of interviews Eid undertook

with his close and extended family about a

massacre that took place one evening in December,

1980. Among the dead were Eid’s parents. Thirty

years later, as he visits his relatives and records

their stories, the question what happened? comes

to be directed more towards the personal, social,

and political circumstances in which the survivors

have coped. In the following discussion I focus on

how Eid’s film addresses this event by concentrating

on its aftermath. I am interested in how Chou

Sar? e ngages t he c apacity o f p ublic a nd p olitical

cultures in Lebanon to approach memory of violence

and enduring trauma as pressing concerns in

and for the present. In doing so, I suggest that the

film works to screen and situate violence and trauma

as both actual and potential modes of address

and response.