Country: Qatar
Length: 13 min
Director: Amal Al-Muftah
Synopsis: Upon hearing a myth about falling stars, a young girl’s curiosity is sparked. When night falls on the village of AlWakrah, she sets out on her father’s boat, with the assistance of her older brother, to chase the fabled comets.
FILMS//أفلام
Sh’hab//شهاب
Shall I Compare You to a Summer’s Day?//بشتقلك ساعات
Country: Egypt, Lebanon, Germany
Director: Mohammad Shawky Hassan
Length: 63 mins
Synopsis: Pop clichés are twisted with the love between two men who encounter a polyamorous chorus of lovers.
Simo
Country: Canada
Director: Aziz Zoromba
Length: 23 mins
Synopsis: The usual rivalries and jealousies that exist between the two teenage brothers Simo and Emad take a dangerous turn that may seriously impact the future of their family.
Six Feet Over//ما فوق الضريح
Country: France, Algeria
Director: Karim Bensalah
Length: 96 mins
Synopsis: Son of a former Algerian diplomat Sofiane lived his entire life to this point abroad. Now a student in Lyon, he is the victim of an administrative decision and is living under the threat of expulsion.
Six Months
Country: Canada
Director: Robin Riad
Length: 2 mins
Synopsis: “Six Months” is a critique of alcohol within a North American cultural context, through societal pressure and mass marketing.
Sixty Egyptian Pounds//ستين جنيه
Country: Egypt
Director: Amr Salama
Length: 20 mins
Synopsis: A struggling family is attempting to deal with the consequences of a horrible catastrophe.
So Dear, So Lovely
Countries: Canada, Lebanon
Director: Diana Allen
Length: 23 mins
Synopsis: Service taxi driver Abu Hosam, a Palestinian with a varied past, a doubtful future and a majestic present, drives the streets of Beirut and the map of memory, speaking his mind with wild energy and wit. So Dear, So Lovely is a song of grief and exuberance.
So We Live//لنا نعيش
Country: Belgium
Director: Rand Abou Fakher
Length: 15 mins
Synopsis: A family living in a war torn country spends what seems to be a normal evening together. Their conversations shift between casual matters of daily life and survival. This ambiguous situation highlights the aches of how we take time for granted and live life.
Solitaire//محبس
Country: Lebanon
Director: Sophie Boutros
Length: 92 mins
Synopsis: Therese, the mayor’s wife in a Lebanese village, joyfully prepares for an overnight visit of her daughter’s suitor and his parents. She excitedly shares the happy news of the engagement with pictures of her beloved brother who was killed by a Syrian bomb 20 years ago and is still bizarrely present in every corner of her house. Only when the long-awaited guests are at her doorstep, she discovers they are Syrian; this engagement will only happen over Therese’s dead body!
Something from there//شيء من هناك
Country: Canada
Director: Rana Nazzal Hamadeh
Length: 7 mins
Synopsis: Something from there is a short film on the substance of our original lands. How does connection to land change after uprooting and in diaspora? How does matter come to embody our memories and defy official histories? These are some of the open-ended questions asked in this reflection on the complicated implications of wanting a piece of land after displacement. Weaving between the voices of the artist’s parents, one a refugee and the other not, the film is personal, yet evokes a shared Palestinian experience. A fragmented story of the artist’s father’s exile from Palestine in 1948 is the guiding narrative.
Somewhere, but not here
Country: Canada
Director: Karel Malkoun
Length: 23 mins
Synopsis: Miles away, I watch the slow erasing of my home. Scattered between two places, I am no longer anywhere.
Son Of The Streets
Country: Palestine
Director: Mohammed Almughanni
Length: 33 mins
Synopsis: The film depicts the daily life of Khodor, a 13-year-old orphan whose relatives struggle to get him an ID card that proves his existence and gives him the right to education, health care and freedom of movement outside the Palestinian refugee camp of Shatila in Beirut, Lebanon. During the process, long hidden family secrets are revealed.
Space Woman//إمرأة فضاء
Country: Lebanon
Director: Hadi Moussally
Length: 20 mins
Synopsis: Maha, in her sixties, decides at the dawn of her retirement life to realize her craziest dream in her own way
State of Agitation//قلتلك خلص
Country: Lebanon
Director: Elie Khalifé
Length: 100 mins
Synopsis: Living in Beirut, a highly enthusiastic filmmaker is in a state of hyper inspiration characterized by an overfiow of contrasting ideas. As a consequence, his characters will go through compelling and extraordinary circumstances. To clear his mind, he heads north where a screening of his short films is scheduled in a rural public school. A series of encounters along the way will turn his world upside down.
Storm Child
Country: Canada
Director: Ines Guennaoui
Length: 12 mins
Synopsis: Storm Child is a nightmarish incursion in the tormented mind of a four year old child. Yasmine and her family are Algerian refugees who just arrived in Québec during the infamous 1998 ice storm.
Strangers After Midnight
Country: Syria
Director: Kinda Youssef
Length: 22 mins
Synopsis: Moments that unfolded late one night in the life of four Syrian refugees in Paris.
Streams//أطياف
Country: Tunisia
Director: Mehdi Hmili
Length: 122 mins
Synopsis: Amel is released from prison after an adulterous affair. In the violent streets of Tunis, she seeks her missing son Moumen, a young football player destroyed by the scandal.
Sugar Cage//قفص السكر
Country: Syria
Director: Zeina Qahwaji
Length: 60 mins
Synopsis: In an attempt to record a standstill time, the filmmaker examines her intimate life with her aging parents over the course of 8 years since the beginning of war in Syria. The film is questioning a life style, and scenes of isolation and stagnancy that overshadow life in Syria. In parallel, it is observing an intimate, human affection that’s maybe rooted deeper than we may imagine.
Sukar//سُكَّر
Country: Morocco
Director: Illias El Faris
Length: 11 mins
Synopsis: Casablanca’s beach, Morocco. Teenager’s desire for each other is growing discreetly. Adults and children oversee. A fight creates a diversion.
Summer 2006
Country: Czech Republic
Director: Farah Abou Kharroub
Length: 7 mins
Synopsis: Thirteen-year-old Farah filmed a bomb as it hit Beirut’s airport. Her father filmed the years of fighting in Lebanon every day as a war reporter. Images of the city at war are mixed with images of household peace from Farah’s childhood. This collage, created from footage shot by father and daughter, reveals the unbearable length of a conflict that affected two generations.