It’s our town’s other SDAFF. This year’s Third Annual San Diego Arab Film Festival promises three nights featuring seven films from seven countries. The festival runs November 20–22 at the Museum of Photographic Arts in Balboa Park. Tickets run $12 per show, or you can pick up an all-access pass for $60. Here’s a quick rundown of this year’s offerings.
Thursday, November 20: From Morocco comes Laïla Marrakchi’s Rock the Casbah, a family drama about a mother and her three daughters, struggling to work through a death in the family. It screens at 6:30 p.m., followed at 8:30 p.m. by Philippe Aractingi’s Heritages, the sweeping true-life saga of a Lebanese family that, combined, spent five generations eluding war.
Friday, November 21: The evening kicks off at 6:30 p.m. with Rani Massalha’s debut feature. Giraffada (Palestine) tells the story of a young boy, obsessed with giraffes, who manages to smuggle a long-necked, spotted ruminant from Tel Aviv to a zoo in the occupied West Bank. The festival program calls Hamid Benamra’s Pieces of Lives, Pieces of Dreams a film that “traces the work of Algerian artist Mustafa Butajin and his view of the relationship of his art to the Algerian Revolution and other international political movements.” It screens at 8:30 p.m.
Cherien Dabis (<em>Amreeka</em>) writes, directs, and stars in the story of May, a New York writer-type who made bank off her heritage — a book of meditations on Middle Eastern proverbs (just like the ones that serve as title cards!) — and is now returning home to Jordan to get married. The groom, absent until near the end, happens to be from the same town, but while he is a secular Muslim, May is a secular Christian. Right away, there's trouble with Mom (a regal Hiam Abbass), a disapproving evangelical who says she's married to Jesus even as she engages in a little romantic spellcraft. May has her sisters to fall back on, but wouldn't you know it, they have issues of their own. Notable chiefly for its knowing, comfortable depictions of female relationships, sibling relationships, familial relationships. Also its determination to rise above some of its more sitcommy plot points. Bill Pullman gives a nicely pitched performance as the repentant Bad Dad.
Saturday, November 22: A triple-header awaits, starting at 5 p.m. Mohamed Malas’s Ladder to Damascus follows a young actress who believes her soul to be occupied by a child who died the day she was born. In My Mother’s Arms is a gripping documentary account of one compassionate soul who devotes his life to protecting orphans of war. The film, directed by Atea Al Daradji and Mohamed Al Daradji, screens at 7 p.m. Rounding out the evening at 9 p.m. is May in the Summer, the latest comedy-drama from Cherien Dabis (Amreeka).
For more information visit sdaff.karamanow.org.
It’s our town’s other SDAFF. This year’s Third Annual San Diego Arab Film Festival promises three nights featuring seven films from seven countries. The festival runs November 20–22 at the Museum of Photographic Arts in Balboa Park. Tickets run $12 per show, or you can pick up an all-access pass for $60. Here’s a quick rundown of this year’s offerings.
Thursday, November 20: From Morocco comes Laïla Marrakchi’s Rock the Casbah, a family drama about a mother and her three daughters, struggling to work through a death in the family. It screens at 6:30 p.m., followed at 8:30 p.m. by Philippe Aractingi’s Heritages, the sweeping true-life saga of a Lebanese family that, combined, spent five generations eluding war.
Friday, November 21: The evening kicks off at 6:30 p.m. with Rani Massalha’s debut feature. Giraffada (Palestine) tells the story of a young boy, obsessed with giraffes, who manages to smuggle a long-necked, spotted ruminant from Tel Aviv to a zoo in the occupied West Bank. The festival program calls Hamid Benamra’s Pieces of Lives, Pieces of Dreams a film that “traces the work of Algerian artist Mustafa Butajin and his view of the relationship of his art to the Algerian Revolution and other international political movements.” It screens at 8:30 p.m.
Cherien Dabis (<em>Amreeka</em>) writes, directs, and stars in the story of May, a New York writer-type who made bank off her heritage — a book of meditations on Middle Eastern proverbs (just like the ones that serve as title cards!) — and is now returning home to Jordan to get married. The groom, absent until near the end, happens to be from the same town, but while he is a secular Muslim, May is a secular Christian. Right away, there's trouble with Mom (a regal Hiam Abbass), a disapproving evangelical who says she's married to Jesus even as she engages in a little romantic spellcraft. May has her sisters to fall back on, but wouldn't you know it, they have issues of their own. Notable chiefly for its knowing, comfortable depictions of female relationships, sibling relationships, familial relationships. Also its determination to rise above some of its more sitcommy plot points. Bill Pullman gives a nicely pitched performance as the repentant Bad Dad.
Saturday, November 22: A triple-header awaits, starting at 5 p.m. Mohamed Malas’s Ladder to Damascus follows a young actress who believes her soul to be occupied by a child who died the day she was born. In My Mother’s Arms is a gripping documentary account of one compassionate soul who devotes his life to protecting orphans of war. The film, directed by Atea Al Daradji and Mohamed Al Daradji, screens at 7 p.m. Rounding out the evening at 9 p.m. is May in the Summer, the latest comedy-drama from Cherien Dabis (Amreeka).
For more information visit sdaff.karamanow.org.
Comments