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The Red Sea International Film Festival (Rsiff) has announced its full industry programme. Running from December 7th to 11th, 2024, in Jeddah’s vibrant Al Balad district, this year’s expanded five-day program offers an exceptional line-up of activities bringing together new talent, emerging filmmakers and established regional and international industry leaders for a series of events, talks and networking opportunities. The Red Sea Souk activities will take place alongside the growing marketplace which features 142 exhibitors from 32 countries this year.

Shivani Pandya Malhotra, Rsiff’s Managing Director, said: “The Souk is a vital part of the Rsiff experience, serving as a hub for collaboration, innovation, and opportunity. This year, we are more committed than ever to creating an environment where filmmakers, producers, and industry professionals can come together to share knowledge, forge meaningful connections, and shape the future of cinema. We are excited to present this year’s events and thankful...

James Bond producer Barbara Broccoli was one of the guests at a gala dinner hosted by the Doha Film Institute (Dfi) and the Media City Qatar (McQ) on the fringes of the Venice Film Festival on Monday evening.

The veteran producer’s presence added fuel to recent reports that she is attempting to secure Qatari finance for ex-James Bond actor Daniel Craig’s big screen passion project Othello, with well-placed sources hinting on Monday night that talks were ongoing.

Related: ‘Russians At War’ Teaser: Anastasia Trofimova’s Doc Gives Rare Insight Into Life Of Russian Soldiers On The Frontline In Ukraine – Venice

Broccoli — who is co-head of James Bond producer Eon Productions with Michael G. Wilson — has reportedly been working with Craig for some time on the project, billed as a modern adaptation of the Shakespearean classic set in American army barracks in Iraq.

Related: ‘King Ivory’: Melissa Leo,...

Dozens of figures including Elia Suleiman and Farah Nabulsi are responding to attempts to remove Bisan Owda’s documentary from the Emmys

Dozens of Palestinian film-makers have signed an open letter protesting against Hollywood’s “inhumanity and racism” toward Palestinians and calling on “international colleagues in the film industry” to speak out.

The letter, published in Variety, was signed by notables including Elia Suleiman, director of Divine Intervention and It Must Be Heaven, Hany Abu-Assad (Paradise Now), and Farah Nabulsi, director of forthcoming feature film The Teacher.

Mohamed Kordofani’s Goodbye Julia and Kaouther Ben Hania’s Four Daughters lead the nominations for the 8th Critics Awards for Arab Films, which will be held during the upcoming Cannes Film Festival.

Both features picked up seven nominations apiece for the awards, focused on Arab films that were produced and premiered outside of the Arab world in 2023. Overseen and run by the Cairo-based Arab Cinema Centre (Acc), it was voted on by 209 critics from 72 countries and the winners will be announced during Cannes on May 18.

Scroll down for full list of nominations

This year’s nominees range from Sudan,...

Sarajevo Film Festival will honour Palestinian director Elia Suleiman with its Honorary Heart of Sarajevo Award, and will screen a retrospective of selected works by the filmmaker.

The award will be presented to Suleiman at the 30th edition of the festival, which takes place from August 16-23.

Suleiman was a guest at the festival in 2019, where his film It Must Be Heaven was screened in the Open Air programme. He also served as the president of the jury at the festival in 2016.

Suleiman’s first feature Chronicle of a Disappearance won the Best First Film Prize at Venice in 1996. In...

The 30th Sarajevo Film Festival will pay tribute to Palestinian director Elia Suleiman in recognition of his “outstanding contribution to the art of film.” The filmmaker will be presented with the Honorary Heart of Sarajevo Award and honored with a retrospective of his selected works in the festival’s “Tribute to” program.

Suleiman was a guest at Sarajevo in 2019, where his film “It Must Be Heaven” was screened in the Open Air program. The film had received the special jury mention at Cannes the same year. He also served as the president of the jury at Sarajevo in 2016, and was a guest at the festival in 2013.

Jovan Marjanović, the festival’s director, said Suleiman’s “universal language of cinema speaks to fundamental human values and emotions: fear and hope, home and homeland.”

He added, “With his trademark wit, humor and profound insight, he navigates the complexities of our existence, shedding...

Anthony Scaramucci To Host U.S. Edition Of ‘The Rest Is Politics’

Anthony Scaramucci is getting into podcasting. The former White House Director of Communications will host an American edition of British podcast The Rest is Politics alongside Katty Kay, U.S. Special Correspondent for BBC Studios. Starting Friday (April 26) The pair will look to uncover secrets from inside Joe Biden and Donald Trump’s inner circles, and take a wider look at the intricacies of U.S. society and how they shape the world’s most important economy. New episodes will be released every Friday. Produced by football veteran Gary Lineker’s Goalhanger Films, The Rest is Politics launched in the UK in 2022, with former Downing Street Director of Communications and Strategy Alastair Campbell and former Cabinet Minister Rory Stewart at the helm. This week, hosts Campbell and Stewart were announced to be presenting UK network Channel 4’s...

Mad Solutions has acquired world sales rights to Osn’s first-ever original feature, “Yellow Bus,” which world premiered at the Toronto Film Festival.

As well as world sales, Mad Solutions will handle Middle East and North Africa theatrical distribution, while Osn will handle all other Mena rights. Sikhya Entertainment will handle distribution in the Indian subcontinent.

In U.S. filmmaker Wendy Bednarz’s feature debut, an Indian woman living in the Arabian Gulf embarks on a search for truth and accountability after her daughter is left to die on a school bus in the sweltering desert heat.

The film stars Syrian actress Kinda Alloush, alongside Indian star Tannishtha Chatterjee, who was nominated for best actress at the British Independent Film Awards for “Brick Lane,” as well as fellow prominent Indian actor Amit Sial, who is known for the series “Inside Edge,” and Aarushi Laud, who plays the daughter.

The film...

Three categories have been added to this year’s awards.

Moroccan filmmaker Maryam Touzani’s The Blue Caftan leads the nominations in the 7th Critics Awards for Arab Films, which has added categories for best editing, cinematography and music.

The Arabic-language drama, in which a woman and her closeted gay husband hire a young apprentice at their caftan store, secured seven nominations – every category except editing and documentary. The film premiered in Un Certain Regard at Cannes last year and was Morocco’s submission for the international feature film Oscar, making the shortlist but not final nominations.

A strong showing...

The Doha Film Institute’s Qumra talent and project incubator event returned as a 100% in-person event last week, bringing participants together face-to-face in Doha for the first time since it was forced online in 2020 due to the Covid-19 pandemic.

“It’s been great to have everyone back gain. I keep pinching myself that it’s still happening. I could not be happier with how it has gone,” said Dfi CEO Fatma Hassan Alremaihi.

The ninth edition, running from March 10 to 15, gathered 44 Dfi grantee projects across all formats and in various stages of development and production, accompanied by their first, second and third-time directors and producers.

The Dfi is one of the main sources of funding for independent cinema in the Middle East and North Africa, a region with very little state support for independent film.

“We have between 400 to 500 submissions per cycle, and we have two cycles a year. It...

Fipresci Jury Award-winning “A Gaza Weekend” made a splash at Toronto International Film Festival last week. Public and press alike flocked towards theaters for this film’s premiere weekend; each screening was packed. The film’s release could not have been more timely. Written during the swine flu and released after the peak of the Covid-19 pandemic, British-Palestinian Basil Khalil pokes fun at plague paranoia in his narrative feature debut. In this punchy family-friendly comedy of the Gaza Strip, any and all traditional power hierarchies are out the window for the sake of survival.

A Gaza Weekend is screening at Toronto International Film Festival

Like many films about Palestine, “A Gaza Weekend” follows the trajectory of a refugee couple – though this time, they’re from Israel. Englishman Michael (Stephen Mangan) and his Israeli partner Keren (Mouna Hawa) are desperate to leave the country after the outbreak of a new deadly Ars virus.

He will be presented with the European achievement in world cinema award on December 10.

The European Film Academy will present Palestinian filmmaker Elia Suleiman with the European achievement in world cinema award at this year’s European Film Awards in Reykjavik on December 10.

He is the first Palestinian director to receive the honour.

Suleiman wrote, directed and starred in his debut feature Chronicle Of A Disappearance in 1996. The film detailed his experiences returning to Israel and picked the Luigi De Laurentiis Award for debut feature at Venice.

Divine Intervention was the first of many of Suleiman’s films to screen at Cannes.

The European Film Academy will honor Palestinian auteur Elia Suleiman with its European Achievement in World Cinema Award.

The Paris-based Suleiman, whose most recent work “It Must Be Heaven” premiered in 2019 at Cannes, is the first Palestinian director to win this prestigious prize.

Suleiman will be an honorary guest at the 35th European Film Awards ceremony to be held on Dec. 10 in Reykjavik.

Born in Nazareth, Suleiman started his career in New York where in the early 1990s he shot two short films, “Introduction to the End of an Argument” and “Homage by Assassination” which won several prizes.

Suleiman’s debut feature film, “Chronicle of a Disappearance,” on the loss of national identity in Israel’s Arab population, won the first film prize at the 1996 Venice Film Festival. In 2002, his “Divine Intervention” won the jury prize and the Fipresci Intl. Critics Prize of the Cannes Film Festival, as well as...

Zeynep Atakan, the producer of Nuri Bilge Ceylan’s Palme d’Or winner “Winter Sleep,” has come on board to co-produce and handle international sales for “Hilal, Feza and Other Planets,” director Kutluğ Ataman’s follow-up to his 2014 Berlin Film Festival player, “The Lamb.”

The film begins soon after Turkey’s September 1997 coup, when Hilal and Fatma leave their Muslim town near the Turkish capital, Ankara, to study at the state university in Istanbul. A new law bars Fatma from entering the campus if she wears her religious head scarf. Meanwhile, their downstairs neighbor, Feza, has fled her own village where she was cruelly bullied for being a transgender woman. Hilal chooses to help Feza and Fatma, and against all odds, they’re brought together in the struggle for their rights.

“Hilal, Feza and Other Planets,” which Ataman shot on his smart phone, took part in Cannes’ Cinefondation Atelier in 2015. Currently in post-production,...

Past best film awards from the previous five editions include Wajib, Yomeddine and Gaza Mon Amour.

Jordanian director Bassel Ghandour’s The Alleys and Egyptian director Omar El Zohairy’s Feathers lead the nominations in the sixth edition of the Critics Awards for Arab Films.

The films each garnered nominations in four categories, including best film, director and screenplay.

Spearheaded and run by the Cairo-based Arab Cinema Centre (Acc), this edition focused on Arab-language films that premiered on the festival circuit outside of the Arab world in 2021.

It was voted on by 167 film critics from 68 countries, who viewed the films on Festival Scope.

Mounia Akl’s long-awaited “Costa Brava, Lebanon” (2021) marks an impressive first feature. Eight different countries backed “Costa Brava”’s production, in addition to Akl’s own three completed residences at Cannes, Sundance, and Torino. The film’s international reception has also been warm. With a world premiere at Venice, a North American premiere at Toronto, and now a screening at Sffilm, “Costa Brava” ushers in Akl as an up-and-coming icon of Lebanese cinema. Crowds at home agree too: this film was recently selected as the Lebanese entry for the Best International Feature Film at this year’s Academy Awards.

The accolades are not unwarranted. “Costa Brava” masters the universal and the local at once. In this contemporary fiction, three generations of the Badri family reside in an idyllic mountain home. Though the location is picture-perfect, familial arguments bubble up beneath the surface. Grandmother Zeina (Liliane Chacar Khoury), ex-singer Soraya (Nadine Labaki...

Snd is teaming up with Easy Riders Films to develop a premium limited series loosely based on “The Family,” Suzanne Privat’s best-selling investigative book on a French cult which has existed for more than 200 years.

“The Family” is penned by rising French screenwriter Clémence Madeleine-Perdrillat, whose recent credits include “Nona and Her Daughters,” as well as the Amazon Original show “Mixte.” She led the writing team for season 2 of “In Treatment.”

Set in Paris’s underworld, the thriller series will shed right on the rites and customs of this enigmatic religious sect from diverse perspectives, focusing on the experiences of those inside and outside the community. The book, whose French title is “La Famille, itinéraires d’un secret,” was published by Les Avrils editions in 2021.

Madeleine-Perdrillat said “The Family” “offers the incredible opportunity to untangle the torments, paradoxes and quiet loyalties at the root of all families — all in...

Five works in progress and 11 films in development due to be showcased at event running December 8-11.

The Red Souk, the industry component of Saudi Arabia’s Red Sea International Film Festival’s project market, has unveiled fresh details for its inaugural edition running December 8-11.

Running within the framework of its larger parent festival, which will also mark its first edition this year from December 6-15, the souk will focus on Arab and African filmmakers and will feature a project market, work in progress screenings, an exhibition space and an industry talks programme.

Lebanese-French director Wissam Charaf’s Beirut-set romantic drama Dirty Difficult Dangerous,...

Keep track of when films are coming out in the territory.

Cinemas in the UK and Ireland are set to reopen this spring, following months of closures due to the Covid-19 pandemic.

Screen is listing the release dates for films in the territory in the calendar below. For distributors who wish to add/amend a date on the calendar, please get in touch with Screen here.

Indoor cinemas in England and Scotland will be allowed to reopen from May 17; with dates yet to be confirmed for Wales, Northern Ireland and Ireland.

Screen is also tracking reopening dates of cinemas in...

It Must be Heaven played at the London Film Festival back in 2019, and while showing, we had the pleasure of speaking to its director Elia Suleiman. The film, which takes a sardonic, satirical view on the world, and displays, through sharp and subtle comedy, that no matter where you live, no matter who you are, deep down we’re really just the same. He discusses this themes with us as we sat over a coffee, and also tells us what it is like being a Palestinian filmmaker, and how so many misjudge and underestimate his work given his nationality, and struggle to understand that comedically inclined films can come from anywhere.

Hi Elia, I really enjoyed the film. Where did this idea first come from?

This answer will take up our entire twelve minutes. It’s actually coming from the same position as you saying you enjoyed the film. The fact is,...

Several titles got just past the £1m mark across the weekend.

Rank Film (Distributor) Three-day gross (Jun 18-20) Total gross to date Week 1 Peter Rabbit 2: The Runaway (Sony) £1.1m £15.3m 5 2 In The Heights (Warner Bros) £1.1m £1.1m 1 3 The Hitman’s Wife’s Bodyguard (Lionsgate) £1m £1.6m 1 4 A Quiet Place Part II (Paramount) £1m £8.3m 3 5 Cruella (Disney) £731,639 £7m 4

Gbp to Usd conversion rate: 1.39

Warner Bros’ musical In The Heights reached second place on its opening weekend at the UK-Ireland box office, as Peter Rabbit 2: The Runaway surged back to the top spot with a 38% weekend-on-weekend rise.

The family sequel added...

Elia Suleiman returned in 2019 to Cannes with his long-awaited fourth feature: It Must Be Heaven, an existentialist comedy which sees the director travel from his native Nazareth to New York via Paris on an existential(ist) journey peppered with surrealistic, mostly hilarious micro-encounters in the vein of the auteur’s previous works. Often central in Suleiman’s cinema is his own image, which in itself is largely based on his own persona and biography—acting as a concrete instance of a witness (onto which the spectator can project or latch themselves), caught in the fray of actions other than his own. He’s a silent yet nonetheless reactive observer of the oddities of quotidian life (thus inspiring comparisons with the work of the legendary Jacques Tati), which draw upon everything from a neighbor who gets territorial around an orange tree to French policemen zooming the streets on Segways, which he...

Often compared to Buster Keaton and Jacques Tati, Palestinian director Elia Suleiman has developed during the years in both his short and feature films, a very original cinematic language, using rather few words and lots of sense of humour to observe and comment on the Israeli-Palestinian situation. The 2002 “Divine Intervention” is the film that fine tunes his trademark style, initiated in “Chronicle of a Disappearance” (1996) and that will evolve in “The Time That Remains” (2009) – a film based in part on his father’s diaries – and in his latest “It Must Be Heaven” (2019) a work about, in the director’s own words, the “Palestinisation of the Globe”. “Divine Intervention” is also the work that brought Suleiman under the international spotlight as it was nominated for the Palme d’Or award at the 2002 Cannes Film Festival and was also considered for the 2003 Academy Awards. Unfortunately, in a twist of fate that ironically...

The seventh edition will nurture 48 projects by first and second-time directors hailing mainly from the Arab world.

The Doha Film Institute (Dfi) kicked off the online edition of its seventh annual talent and project development meeting Qumra on Friday.

Unfolding from March 12-17, the event will nurture 48 short and feature-length films at different stages of their creation from 41 countries, that have previously received the support of the Dfi grants programme.

They range from in-development projects such as Moroccan director Kamal Lazraq’s Casablanca-set kidnap caper Hounds to projects in post-production including Lebanese filmmaker Mounia Akl’s Costa Brava Lebanon,...

Popular French theater director Jean-Christophe Meurisse is making his sophomore film outing with “Bloody Oranges,” a black comedy headlined by Denis Podalydès (“La Belle Epoque”), Blanche Gardin (“Delete History”) and Christophe Paou (“Synonyms”).

Brussels-based outfit Best Friend Forever has acquired international sales rights to the film, which is produced by Rectangle Prods. “(“It Must Be Heaven,” “Climax”) and Mamma Roman.

“Bloody Oranges” marks Meurisse’s follow-up to “Apnee,” which premiered in Cannes Critics’ Week in 2016. Meurisse is also a well-known figure in the world of theater, having launched the Chiens de Navarre theater troupe.

“Bloody Oranges” takes place in contemporary France and weaves the stories of a retired couple overwhelmed by debt trying to win a dance contest, a minister of economy who is suspected of tax evasion, a teenage girl coming across a sexual maniac and young lawyer trying to climb the social ladder. When the shoe drops, the...

By Shikhar Verma

Arab and Tarzan Nasser are twin brother filmmakers from Gaza. Their sophomore film is a sweet-natured romance within a conservative regime. Funny, charming, and above all, quietly tender and simplistic in its representation of yearning for love, “Gaza Mon Amour” is a captivating romantic comedy set in a turbulent time in Palestine.

The film follows the life of a 60-year-old fisherman named Issa (Salim Dau). He is a lonesome wolf who goes out to fish on his own and mostly lives by himself. Other than the occasional visit from a nosy sister, there’s nothing much to accompany him in his daily life. Sans the occasional chat with a workmate, he almost always keeps it to himself. He isn’t complaining though. The reason why he keeps going is his tender feelings for Siham (Hiam Abbass). She is a dressmaker who runs a shop that passes through the fish market.

“Love Mooning,” a drama by veteran Japanese director Manda Kunitoshi, has been set as the opening film of Tokyo Filmex. The festival announced the line-up for its 21st edition on Thursday.

Filmex, which has long specialized in Asian art films and usually starts in late November, will be held Oct. 30-Nov. 7 this year. It will be operated in partnership with the Tokyo International Film Festival, whose dates are Oct.31-Nov. 9.

“Love Mooning,” charts the troubled romance between the head of a mental health clinic and one of his patients. Manda also chairs the festival’s five-person jury.

The closing film will be Elia Suleiman’s “It Must Be Heaven,” a 2019 Cannes selection about a director, played by Suleiman himself, who finds himself comically trapped in Palestine even when he is in New York and Paris. Suleiman is also the subject of the festival’s Filmmaker in Focus section, which will...

A minimalist deadpan dramedy with serious political undertones, Gaza Mon Amour offers up a vision of the Palestinian situation at once realistic and absurdist, revealing how even the simplest of love stories can be thwarted by a repressive government, collective human foibles and an ancient Greek statue with a major erection.

This second feature from the directing duo of Tarzan and Arab Nasser (Dégradé) has hints of Jim Jarmusch and Aki Kaurismäki, although it feels closest to the witty, surreal works of fellow Palestinian Elie Suleiman (It Must Be Heaven). It’s a rather ludicrous tale set in an even more ludicrous ...

A minimalist deadpan dramedy with serious political undertones, Gaza Mon Amour offers up a vision of the Palestinian situation at once realistic and absurdist, revealing how even the simplest of love stories can be thwarted by a repressive government, collective human foibles and an ancient Greek statue with a major erection.

This second feature from the directing duo of Tarzan and Arab Nasser (Dégradé) has hints of Jim Jarmusch and Aki Kaurismäki, although it feels closest to the witty, surreal works of fellow Palestinian Elie Suleiman (It Must Be Heaven). It’s a rather ludicrous tale set in an even more ludicrous ...

Roy Andersson’s “About Endlessness” and Tsai Ming-liang’s “Days” are among the highlights of the Masters and Auteurs section of the upcoming Hong Kong International Film Festival. The festival will hold screenings in front of live audiences next month.

It had originally been scheduled to take place in March, but was postponed due to the coronavirus outbreak. The 44th edition will now run Aug. 18-31.

“Endlessness” earned Andersson the best director award at the Venice festival last year. While another selection, Pedro Costa’s “Vitalina Varela” earned the top prize at the Locarno festival last August.

Other films in the section include: “Balloon” by Pema Tseden; “Ema” by Pablo Larrain; “It Must Be Heaven,” by Elia Suleiman; “Marghe and Her Mother” by Mohsen Makhmalbaf; and “The Cordillera of Dreams” by Patricio Guzman.

The festival says that it expects to round out the section with other titles by Bruno Dumont,...

‘The Personal History of David Copperfield.’

The floodgates opened last weekend with more than a dozen new releases led by The Personal History of David Copperfield, plus several re-issues as more cinemas turned the lights back on.

However the grosses per title reflect the “new normal,” with limited seating capacity and reduced sessions.

The safe distancing rules mean there is a cap of 20 people per session in Victoria, between 20 per cent and 45 per cent in New South Wales and 50 per cent in South Australia.

The top 20 titles racked up nearly $2.5 million, up 251 per cent on the previous frame, according to Numero.

Released by Roadshow, Armando Ianucci’s The Personal History of David Copperfield, a re-imagination of the Charles Dickens novel starring Dev Patel, Tilda Swinton, Hugh Laurie, Peter Capaldi and Ben Whishaw, rang up $330,000 on 203 screens and $376,000 including previews.

“Cinemas in some states only just reopened and it takes time...

Arab Cinema Center Reveals Winners of 4th Critics Awards For Arab FilmsWithin the Virtual Cannes Marché du FilmThrough a virtual ceremony through Zoom platform, the Arab Cinema Center (Acc) revealed the winners of the fourth edition of its Critics Awards for Arab Films during the Virtual Marché du Film. The award is submitted based on the voting of a jury of 141 members from across 57 countries. The critics have viewed Arab feature and documentary films produced in 2019 on Festival Scope.

To watch the award ceremony check the following link: https://youtu.be/qz1m0KElw5I

For the first time in the history of Arab cinema, the jury committee brings together 141 of the most prominent Arab and international film critics from 57 countries from all over the world this year.

Furthermore, the Arab Cinema Center announced that American film critic Deborah Young is the newly assigned Manager of the Critics’ Awards for Arab Films.

Votes were cast by 141 Arab and international critics from 57 territories.

Palestinian filmmaker Elia Suleiman’s It Must Be Heaven has scooped best film and director in the fourth edition of the Critics Awards for Arab Films.

The comedy originally premiered in Cannes Competition in 2019, garnering a special mention, and was Palestine’s submission for the 2020 Academy Awards.

In other awards, Egyptian-Tunisian actress Hend Sabry was feted with best actress for her performance in Tunisian director Hinde Boujemaa’s Noura’s Dream as a woman trying to escape the clutches of a violent husband.

French-Tunisian actor Sami Bouajila was named best actor...

Fourth edition is based on votes of 142 Arab and international critics hailing from 57 countries.

Elia Suleiman’s It Must Be Heaven and Maryam Touzani’s Adam received four nominations each in the first round of voting in this year’s Critics Awards for Arab Films.

A total of 142 Arab and international film critics from 57 countries are participating in the fourth edition of the awards, organised by the Arab Cinema Centre (Acc).

Suleiman’s comedy-drama It Must Be Heaven, which premiered in Cannes Competition in 2019, has been nominated for best film, director, actor (Suleiman) and screenplay.

Moroccan filmmaker Touzani’s feature directorial debut Adam,...

Adam 2019 Photo: Courtesy of Cannes Film Festival The shortlisted nominees for the Critics Awards for Arab Films have been announced. The award has been voted on by 142 film critics from 57 countries in under its jury committee. The winners will be announced during the upcoming edition of the Virtual Cannes Market (June 22-26).

Elia Sulieman's absurdist consideration of the Palestine situation, It Must Be Heaven and Maryam's female-centric drama Adam lead the nominations list with four each.

Co-founders of Acc, Alaa Karkouti and Maher Diab said: "We're proud to announce the fourth edition of the Critics' Awards for Arab Films. Although we won't be able to hold the reception in Cannes as usual, however we're happy that it shall continue as part of the festival in its virtual edition this year.

“We are also thrilled to announce Deborah Young as the newly appointed Manager of the Critics Awards for Arab Films for the next two years,...

“We finished the shoot for Ely Dagher’s Harvest just as the first case of Covid-19 was reported in Lebanon.”

Beirut-based producer Georges Schoucair is the founder and CEO of top Middle East independent film production house Abbout Productions and its more recently created sister company Schortcut Films.

The recent credits of Abbout Productions include Oualid Mouaness’s coming-of-age drama 1982, which was Lebanon’s submission to the Academy Awards’ best international film category this year; Ahmad Ghossein’s All This Victory, which premiered in Venice Critics’ Week; and Egyptian filmmaker Mohamed Siam’s feature-length documentary Amal.

Schortcut Films, which he...

“We finished the shoot for Ely Dagher’s film Harvest just as the first case of Covid-19 was reported in Lebanon.”

Beirut-based producer Georges Schoucair is the founder and CEO of top Middle East independent film production house Abbout Productions and its more recently created sister company Schortcut Films.

The recent credits of Abbout Productions include Oualid Mouaness’s bittersweet coming-of-age drama 1982, which premiered at Toronto and was Lebanon’s submission to the Academy Awards’ best international film category this year; Ahmad Ghossein’s All This Victory, which premiered in Venice Critics’ Week, winning three awards, and Egyptian filmmaker Mohamed Siam’s feature-length documentary Amal.

Audiences to be directed to digital platform Curzon Home Cinema.

UK cinema chain Curzon is to close its theatres following government advice over the spread of coronavirus and direct audiences to digital platform Curzon Home Cinema.

The company operates 13 cinemas around the country, which will be closed from Thursday (March 19) and comes the day after UK prime minister Boris Johnson advised people to avoid theatres and pubs, while stopping short of forcing venues to close.

It is the latest cinema chain to announce closures on the day Odeon, Vue, Cineworld, Picturehouse, Everyman and BFI Southbank committed to shutter operations amid the Covid-19 pandemic.

Ladj Ly’s Oscar-nominated drama “Les Miserables” won best film, male newcomer and script at the Lumières Awards, the French prizes given by Paris-based members of the foreign press. This 25th edition of the awards was presided over by French actress Isabelle Huppert.

The searing police violence drama previously won the jury prize at Cannes, and just earned the Goya award in Spain for best foreign film. It is currently vying for best international feature film at the Oscars.

Alexis Manenti, one of the leading actors of “Les Miserables” won best male newcomer, and also shared the best screenplay gong with Ly and Giordano Gederlini. The film was produced by Toufik Ayadi and Christophe Barral of Srab films.

“Les Miserables” was inspired by the 2005 French riots and examines the tensions between neighborhood residents and police that helped inflame the rioting. It centers on three cops who find themselves overrun during the course of an arrest.

The French cinema-focused awards are regarded as the country’s equivalent of the Golden Globes.

Ladj Ly’s Oscar hopeful Les Misérables was the big winner at France’s Lumiere awards in Paris on Monday evening (January 27), winning best film for the explosive drama revolving around a stand-off between youngsters and police officers on a tough Paris housing estate.

The French cinema awards - overseen by the Lumière Academy comprising some 130 international correspondents hailing from 40 countries based in France – are regarded as the country’s equivalent of the Golden Globes.

Ly also won the best screenplay prize for Les Misérables,...

The annual Palm Springs International Film Festival in California is always an opportunity to catch up on many of the contenders for the Best International Feature — née Best Foreign-Language — Film Academy Award. Now in its 31st edition, the festival this year has 51 of them, from favorite-to-beat “Parasite” from South Korea and Senegal’s “Atlantics,” to other films quietly making strides in the race: Czech Republic’s “The Painted Bird,” Sweden’s “And Then We Danced,” Russia’s “Beanpole,” Romania’s “The Whistlers,” North Macedonia’s documentary contender “Honeyland,” Norway’s “Out Stealing Horses,” and many more.

The festival will screen 188 films from 81 countries, including 51 premieres, from January 2-13, 2020. The Awards Buzz section includes a special jury of international film critics, who will review these films to present the Fipresci Award for Best Foreign Language Film of the Year, as well as Best Actor, Best Actress, and Best Screenplay in this category.

One hundred eighty-eight films films from 81 countries including 51 premieres highlight the lineup for the 31st annual Palm Springs International Film Festival, which kicks off January 2 with a star-studded gala that has become a must-stop during awards season for Oscar hopefuls. The festival, which runs through January 13, also is known for showcasing a large number of submissions in the Motion Picture Academy’s International Film (formerly Foreign Language) competition and will feature 51 of those entries.

The opening-night film on January 3 is the Italian farce An Almost Ordinary Summer, while the closer is director Peter Cattaneo’s heartwarming dramedy Military Wives in which Kristin Scott Thomas, Sharon Horgan and Jason Flemyng lead a superb ensemble cast. The film had its world premiere at September’s Toronto International Film Festival and became an instant crowd-pleaser. Bleecker Street releases it in 2020.

Among the previously announced honorees at the January 2 gala are Antonio Banderas, Renee Zellweger,...

Looking back at the lineups of key festivals such as Cannes and Venice this year, 2019 stands out as a banner year for movies from the African continent and the Arab world.

During a panel hosted at the Netflix-sponsored industry event Atlas Workshops during the Marrakech Film Festival, Rémi Bonhomme, who works at Cannes’ Critics’ Week and heads up the conference, pointed out the vital role of festivals in showcasing films from the Mena region.

“There were even films from the region playing in the official selection at Cannes, most of which were debut films, apart from Elia Suleiman’s “It Must Be Heaven.” He cited Mati Diop’s “Atlantics,” which competed at Cannes and won the Grand Prize, and “Papicha” and “Adam,” which played in Un Certain Regard. These three films are representing Senegal, Algeria and Morocco, respectively, in the international feature film section of the Oscars.

In Venice,...

In a freewheeling masterclass held at the Marrakech Film Festival on Thursday, director Elia Suleiman offered as concise a mission statement as can be, defining his guiding beliefs in four short words.

“Pleasure is extremely political,” said the Palestinian director, whose films have approached the fraught nature of life in the occupied territories with a comedic bent and an absurdist tone. “The repercussion of a moment of pleasure is extremely political in the positive sense of the word. It’s against those who want to impose on you their own agenda, those who want to program your daily life.”

When asked about his tendency play up the ridiculous nature of soldiers, police officers and other agents of the state, he explained that, “pleasure has the potential to threaten, to crack positions of authority.”

He continued, “If you try to imagine authorities always posed as a force, they’re not easy to crack.

This year, with some mighty titles from the Maghreb evaluated alongside the rest of continental Africa, the competitive potential of the Middle East lineup handicapped here may seem a tad diminished. Nevertheless, the territory boasts a possible short-list contender in Palestinian helmer Elia Suleiman’s wry travelog “It Must Be Heaven,” which nabbed the international critics award at 2019 Cannes.

Back in 2003, Suleiman’s second feature, “Divine Intervention,” marked the first of 12 submissions made by Palestine over the years. During that time, the entries resulted in two nominations, both for films helmed by Hany Abu-Assad: “Paradise Now” (2005) and “Omar” (2013). Now, Suleiman, like Abu-Assad, is recognized as an elder statesman of Palestinian filmmaking as well as an accomplished auteur whose films continue to bear witness to the surreal and the absurd in Palestinian life at home and abroad. Although his work is better-known in Europe than in the U.S., “It Must Be Heaven...

Already vying for six European Film Awards, Roman Polanski’s ‘An Officer and a Spy” (“J’accuse”) is nominated for five Lumieres Awards, the French prizes given by Paris-based members of the foreign press.

The period film, which won the Silver Prize at the Venice Film Festival, is nominated for best film, director, actor (for Oscar-winning Jean Dujardin), script and cinematography.

While Polanski has been at the heart of a widespread backlash following the rape accusation made by the former actress Valentine Monnier last month, “An Officer and a Spy” has been highly successful at the French box office since opening on Nov. 13 and is now nearing 1 million tickets sold.

The movie tells the true story of counter-espionage officer Georges Picquart, who defied orders and embarked on a compromising mission to clear the name of Captain Alfred Dreyfus, a promising French-Jewish officer who was unfairly accused of spying for Germany in the late 1890s.

Cannes Jury Prize winner is also France’s submission to the Oscars this year.

Ladj Ly’s debut feature and Cannes Jury Prize winner Les Misérables, revolving around social tensions in a tough Paris suburb, is the frontrunner in the 25th edition of France’s Lumière awards this year, with seven nominations.

The awards which are voted on by some 130 international correspondents hailing from 40 countries are France’s equivalent of the Golden Globes.

Les Misérables has been nominated for best film, director, screenplay, cinematography, first film and twice in the best new actor section for two of its cast members,...

Films from Africa and the Middle East have enjoyed significant festival presence this year – such as Mati Diop’s French-Senegalese pic “Atlantics,” which won the Grand Jury Prize at the Cannes Film Festival. “In 2019 we saw a new generation of filmmakers emerging on the scene,” says Rémi Bonhomme program manager of Critics’ Week in Cannes and the coordinator of the Atlas Workshops, which run Dec. 3-6 at the Marrakech Film Festival.

At Cannes, in addition to Diop’s prize, Palestinian filmmaker Elia Suleiman won a Jury Special Mention award for his satire “It Must Be Heaven,” and seven African and Arab films screened in the different competitive sections. At Locarno, Senegalese writer-director Mamadou Dia’s won best first feature for “Nafi’s Father” and Algerian helmer Hassen Ferhani won best emerging director award for his documentary “143 Rue du Désert,” which won a postproduction prize at the 2018 Atlas Workshops. At Venice,...

‘Buoyancy’.

Writer-director Rodd Rathjen’s Buoyancy won Best Youth Feature Film at last night’s Asia Pacific Screen Awards (Apsa) in Brisbane.

The award comes just as Rathjen returns to Australia from an Oscar campaign in The States; Buoyancy is Australia’s submission for the Academy Award for Best International Feature Film.

Produced by Causeway Films’ Sam Jennings and Kristina Ceyton with Rita Walsh, Buoyancy details the story of a 14-year old Cambodian boy (Sarm Heng) who heads to Thailand search of a better life, only to find himself trafficked and enslaved on a fishing trawler.

The story of Buoyancy is inspired by real events, and informed by more than 50 interviews Rathjen conducted with people who had been trafficked onto fishing boats, as well as interviews with local communities, former ship captains and NGOs, and other research. An estimated 200,000 men and boys are thought to be in slavery and forced...

Kantemir Balagov’s ‘Beanpole’ picked up two prizes.

Bong Joon Ho’s Palme d’Or winner Parasite won the best feature film prize at the Asia Pacific Screen Awards (Apsa) which were held in Brisbane, Australian on November 21.

It is the first time a South Korean film has won the best film award since Lee Chang-dong’s Sunshine at the inaugural ceremony in 2007.

Scroll down for the full list of winners

Kantemir Balagov’s Beanpole was the only film to pick up two awards. Ksenia Sereda became the first woman to win best cinematography, while Balagov and Terekhov received best screenplay.