Arab Film Festival 2017

Arab Film Festival - October 27-29
Harmony Gold Theatre - Los Angeles

Friday OCT. 27 - 8 PM - SOLITAIRE (Lebanon) - محبس
Opening Night Gala Reception starts at 7 PM

The personal prejudices spewing from the Middle East’s political turmoils form the backdrop of SOLITAIRE, a tragicomic tale of the engagement-gone-wrong between a young Lebanese woman and her Syrian suitor. Playing out an intergenerational rift, it is fitting the film’s young lovers met earlier as family-free expats in the UAE, where first-time director Sophie Boutros is a manager at the American University in Dubai. But the subject here is a formal visit from Samer and his parents to the provincial Lebanese village home of sweetheart Ghada, to ask for her hand in marriage. Haunted by the memory of her brother – who died 20 years ago at the hands of a Syrian bomb – the bride-to-be’s mother Therese (Julia Kassar) is unashamedly racist towards her regional neighbors, a fact exacerbated by the recent refugee crisis, which has displaced more than 1.5 million Syrians into Lebanon’s 4.5 million population. At the movie’s outset, Therese spits out pickles made by refugees and snaps off the radio at the hint of a Syrian melody. What she does not know – due to a piece of absurd duplicity on the part of her husband Maurice, a philandering big-fish-small-pond town mayor – is that a Syrian family is about to arrive on her doorstep. And ask for her daughter’s hand.

Saturday OCT. 28 - 1:30 PM - INVESTIGATING PARADISE (Algeria) - تحقيق في الجنة

From French-Algerian visionary filmmaker Merzak Allouache, Berlinale 2017 pick INVESTIGATING PARADISE is a manifold treatise in what it means to be “radicalized” – a term the Western world has grown quite fond of in recent times. Far from haphazardly mobilizing buzz words in service to reductivism, however, Allouache is concerned with crafting a layered analysis of Algerian millennial culture and the efforts made by Salafi clerics to tempt this particularly vulnerable demograph towards the embrace of jihad. Through a sampling of everyone from college students at internet cafes and a karate instructor, to Imams and social intellectuals, it becomes apparent that Allouache’s position is much deeper than what is readily and regularly espoused per “extremism” and “radicalization” on Western media outlets.

Saturday OCT. 28 - 4 PM - PLAYFUL PONDERINGS (6 Shorts)

From dating drama in Bahrain and an abandoned Qatari cinemaplex, to wacky Lebanese nuns and land mine explosions, this eclectic mix of 6 whimsical, albeit socially-concerned short format narrative works will take viewers on a journey of humor, self-discovery, and provocation.

Saturday OCT. 28 - 6 PM - GAZA SURF CLUB (Palestine)

In the midst of rubble, debris, abandoned tanks, and bombed-out buildings that resemble the landscape of the post-apocalypse, the Gaza Strip and its 1.7 million denizens are no strangers to “social conflict.” With no immediate means of escape framed by an unknown future dictated by the mechanisms of apartheid, surf culture has emerged as an outlet for down-trodden youth to experience a taste of freedom, strewn across 26 miles of Mediterranean coastline. With a rough-around-the-edges yet sincere approach to documentary form, filmmakers Philip Gnadt and Mickey Yamine introduce viewers to Gaza’s surfing subculture, with the endpoint directed at revealing the ever-burning formations of hope that glow in the hearts and minds of Gazan youth in spite of the titan-like hurdles that beset them. Screened in the official selections of the 2016 Toronto and Dubai International Film Festivals.

Saturday OCT. 28 - 8 PM - WITHERED GREEN (Egypt) - أخضر يابس

WITHERED GREEN’s recent success on the festival circuit, including its premiere at the Locarno film festival and Best Feature Director Muhr award at the 2016 Dubai International Film Festival, bespeaks well-deserving praise for Egyptian filmmaker Mohammed Hammad’s first feature, who’s no newcomer to the international scene in lieu of his short films CENTRAL (2008) and PALE RED (2010). By virtue of a delicate, ruminating pace, Hammad crafts an emotionally stratified world where no decision is cast distant from sacrifice for protagonist Iman’s (Heba Ali) tightrope balancing between familial responsibility and self-determination, as she is pressured to search for a suitable male relative who can represent her sister due to gendered local customs that require the presence of a man from the bride’s family during the marriage agreement, being her sister’s closest living intermediary. The only problem: the search isn’t going well, with their father dead, no brother, and wishy-washy elderly uncles. Though an artful placement of the melodrama genre as a starting point, Hammad paints a floaty, daydream indie fresco of the cross-section between inter/intrapersonal relationships and cultural tradition.

Saturday OCT. 28 - 9:30 PM - THE NILE HILTON INCIDENT (Sweden/Egypt)

Set with the backdrop of the Egyptian revolution coupled with a film noir vibe, the story unfolds via detective Noredin Mustafa who is a typical corrupt cop. When he is assigned to investigate the murder of a singer, what he discovers is the victim is involved with the power elite of Egypt and the case goes all the way to the top. His only witness is an unwitting Sudanese hotel housekeeper, who finds herself in the wrong place at the wrong time. Can a corrupt cop get justice? Winner of the World Cinema Grand Jury Prize: Dramatic at the 2017 Sundance Film Festival. From the writer/director of METROPIA (2008), Tarik Saleh.

Sunday OCT. 29 - 2 PM - DRAMATIC VISION (6 Shorts)

A compilation of moody short narratives that demonstrate superbly crafted visual storytelling while engaging important socio-political realities of various parts of the Arab World and beyond. From a father who seeks to protect his only daughter from ISIS to an experimental rendering of Gaza’s 2014 Shujaiya massacre: these films are captivating inasmuch as they touch upon pressing issues.

Sunday OCT. 29 - 4 PM - THE WAR SHOW (Denmark/Syria)

Syrian radio host Obaidah Zytoon and her friends are caught up in the euphoria of the 2011 Arab Spring. Camera in hand, these artists and activists take to the streets to protest Syrian President Bashar al-Assad and record their experiences. They talk about art and relationships as much as politics. But as they film themselves over the next several years, their hopes for a better future are tested by violence, imprisonment, and death. Zytoon and friends have worked with veteran Danish director Andreas Dalsgaard to shape, narrate, and edit years of footage into a deeply moving personal narrative. THE WAR SHOW, subtitled “From Revolution to War in Seven Steps,” stands out from other films on Syria in many ways. Rather than dwelling on scenes of bloodshed, it focuses on what the revolution meant to everyday people. Most of Zytoon’s friends aren’t political firebrands. They share similar aspirations to young people all over the world: to loosen the strictures of religion and repression. In an early protest, Zytoon asks an adolescent girl why she isn’t wearing a headscarf. “I’m not demonstrating to be suffocated,” she says, “I’m demonstrating to breathe.” But dreams of revolution turn into the reality of civil war. Zytoon takes road trips to the centre of rebellion in Homs, to her hometown Zabadani near Lebanon, and to the north of Syria where they meet struggling rebels and witness the rise of extremism.

Sunday OCT. 29 - 6:15 PM - IN BETWEEN (Israel) - بر بحر - לא פה, לא שם

In Maysaloun Hamoud’s directorial debut, she tells the story of three Palestinian women living in Israeli society struggling with being accepted and deviating from the expectations of their culture. Lalia (Mouna Hawa), Salma (Sana Jammelieh), and Nur (Shaden Kanboura) are roommates living in Tel Aviv. Lalia, a criminal lawyer who likes to party after work, has found love with a modern Muslim man who can’t quite accept all sides of her. Salma, a DJ and bartender faces a difficult coming out as gay moment with her traditional Christian family. Nur is a college student who observes Islamic tradition and moves in with Lalia and Salma to be close to the university. When her conservative fiancé visits, however, he is threatened by her liberal roommates, and pressures her to move back to marry him immediately. All three women must learn how to accept themselves in the face of mounting pressure from their loved ones to conform.

Sunday OCT. 29 - 8:30 PM - NUT$ (Lebanon) - ورقة بيضا‎

With a glaringly self aware, idiosyncratic dark comedy vibe reminiscent of the likes of Tarantino or Soderbergh (after a few espresso shots), NUT$ is a non-stop, high stakes high octane ride that pops with the action-packed, sexy intrigue of OCEAN’S 11. Arguably the penultimate emblem of filmmaker Henri Bargès penchant for over-the-top, soulful spectacle to date – who has directed everything from Cannes/Sundance selects to Toyota, Samsung, and Pepsi commercials – NUT$ generates an eclectic tonality that’s exhilarating inasmuch as it is concerned with questions of gender, identity, and self-empowerment, conveyed by poker genius Lana’s (Darine Hamze) efforts to navigate the pressures of a male-dominated (under)world filled with controlling, lurking men and grander societal expectations to be a “normal” housewife. Teeming with femme fatales, mobsters, and a twinge of BDSM fun: Bargès’ latest is sure to please… just don’t forget your seatbelt.

For more information and to buy tickets please visit: AFF2017