Distributed by the www.ArabAmericanNewsWire.com
ALFILM – Arab Film Festival Berlin from 5.- 11. November
2012
ALFILM – Arab Film Festival Berlin will take place from
the 5th to the 11th of November 2012 and is presenting, for the fourth year in
a row, films from the Arab world. ALFILM shows over 40 films from Arab
directors and productions from Arab countries, which until now have been rarely
available to European audiences.
The Main Program of the festival is going to screen
recent fiction and documentary films from Algeria, Iraq, Morocco, Egypt,
Palestine and Lebanon, amongst others.
This year’s opening film Fidaï (2012, Algeria/France/
Qatar/Kuwait /China/Germany) from the young and upcoming director, Damien
Ounouri, tells the story of the Algerian independence movement based on vivid
memories of his great uncle.
Many such inspirational documentary films will be
screened at this year’s ALFILM, such as Uncle Nashat (2011, Jordan/Palestine)
by Aseel Mansour, which reconstructs the story of a political murder, The
Virgin, the Copts and Me (2011, Egypt/Qatar/France) by Namir Abdel Messeeh, a
film that traces apparitions of the virgin Mary in Egypt or Yamo (2011,
Lebanon) by Rami Nihawi, which focuses on a mother, who slowly unveils the
emotional wounds of civil war. In a variety of ways, the films portray the
current political conflicts and social upheavals in the respective countries.
Well worth seeing are feature films such as the Moroccan
comedy Andalousie, mon amour (2011) by Mohamed Nadif or the Iraqi docu-drama
Leaving Baghdad (2010) by Kutaiba Aljanabi. Ismaël Ferroukhi's Free Men (2011)
tells the story of the great Parisian Mosque at the time of National Socialism,
which led to salvation for numerous Algerian Jews.
The special program section Generation in Transit focuses
on perspectives of youth in times of civil unrest by means of historical works
such as: Return of the Lost Son from Youssef Chahine (Egypt, 1976) and West Beyrouth
from Ziad Doueiri (Lebanon, 1998).
This year’s Retrospective sponsored by the Center of
Modern Orient (ZMO), is devoted to the Moroccan director Farida Benlyazid,
whose work deals intensively with the roles of women in Arab society and forms
of resistance. In attendance of the film director, Une porte sur le ciel
(1989), Keid Ensa(1999), Casablanca, Casablanca (2002) and Juanita de Tanger
(2005) will be screened.
Two Short Film Programs as well as an Experimental Film
Program will add to the program.
ALFILM is organised by Friends of Arabic Cinematheque
Association, Berlin. The organization is an independent association, which was
founded with the goal of offering a platform for film productions of Arab
countries in Germany to confront cultural stereotypes about the Arab world
through pictures and stories.
ALFILM will take place from 5.-11.11.2012 at the Babylon
and Eiszeit cinemas.
A Press Sneak Preview will take place on 24.10.2012 at
12:30pm and 15:00pm at the cinema Babylon.
Further notice of this event will be circulated in the
near future.
Accreditation for the 4th edition of ALFILM – Arab Film
Festival Berlin - is now open. The Accreditation form is available at http://alfilm.de/data/2012/Accreditation-Form-ALFILM-2012.pdf.
To receive an accreditation for ALFILM, please fill out
the accreditation form <http://alfilm.de/data/2012/Accreditation-Form-ALFILM-2012.pdf> and send it to us together with a portrait
photo in JPEG format (file name: last name_first name.jpg) via email to akkreditierung@alfilm.de, via fax to
+49-30-40301864 or via post to ALFILM Festival / Accreditation / Potsdamer Str.
151 / 10783 Berlin. Please note that the deadline is October 22nd, 2012. After
this deadline, accreditations can be issued during the festival week at the
guest office, where a late accreditation fee of 5 EUR will be charged.
Festival accreditation costs 30 EUR for film industry
visitors. The fee can be paid in cash only at the time of collecting your
accreditation badge. Press visitors and film guests are accredited free of
charge. Press visitors are kindly asked to additionally provide either a copy
of their press ID, a supporting letter from their editor, or links to/scans of
two recent articles.
Further information concerning your accreditation will be
found in a confirmation letter, which will be sent to you by the end of
October.
For press inquiries please contact:
Katherin Erdelyi katherin.erdelyi@alfilm.de, Mascha
Wilke mascha.wilke@alfilm.de or
ALFILM Office: Potsdamer Str. 151, 10783 Berlin, Germany
email: info@alfilm.de,
tel: 030 40 30 18 63, fax: 030 40 30 18 64.
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