films from warmer places
Since coming to New York, I believe, I've seen more films screened as part of film festivals than not (netflix excepted). I think it's because I get busy and distracted and delay endlessly with the films I mean to see in regular release, but there's something about a festival screening--the sense of a one-off opportunity, a possibly-missed chance, that sends me scurrying to the theater like there's no tomorrow.
Well, today begins another: the 2007 New York Arab and South Asian Film Festival, brought to you via Alwan for the Arts, SAWCC, and other lovely organizations. I'm intrigued by its ambit--this is the only joint MENA/SA festival I've heard of, although there have been at least four desi film fests in NY in the last year--both because the links between the regions & their diasporas are a matter of personal and scholarly interest, and because I am as always nostalgic for SAIFF back home, which introduced me to the cinema of the Middle East for the first time. (An query about terminology, though--why 'Arab and South Asian' when several Iranian films are on offer, too?)
I haven't decided what to see for sure yet, but the adaptation of Mohamed Choukri's For Bread Alone, the documentary These Girls/El-Banate Dol, the Iranian film Border Cafe, and "Palestine Revolution Cinema" and new UK shorts series all look tempting. As does the Nacer Khamir retrospective, but I have a work event that evening.
And I & my Brooklyn gals are certainly planning to go to the opening party tomorrow night, at Alwan, with DJ Rekha hosting and a mix of Arab pop, bhangra, etc. If she plays Hisham Abbas's "Nari Nareen (Habibi Dah)", I am (statistically speaking) likely to kiss somebody.
Well, today begins another: the 2007 New York Arab and South Asian Film Festival, brought to you via Alwan for the Arts, SAWCC, and other lovely organizations. I'm intrigued by its ambit--this is the only joint MENA/SA festival I've heard of, although there have been at least four desi film fests in NY in the last year--both because the links between the regions & their diasporas are a matter of personal and scholarly interest, and because I am as always nostalgic for SAIFF back home, which introduced me to the cinema of the Middle East for the first time. (An query about terminology, though--why 'Arab and South Asian' when several Iranian films are on offer, too?)
I haven't decided what to see for sure yet, but the adaptation of Mohamed Choukri's For Bread Alone, the documentary These Girls/El-Banate Dol, the Iranian film Border Cafe, and "Palestine Revolution Cinema" and new UK shorts series all look tempting. As does the Nacer Khamir retrospective, but I have a work event that evening.
And I & my Brooklyn gals are certainly planning to go to the opening party tomorrow night, at Alwan, with DJ Rekha hosting and a mix of Arab pop, bhangra, etc. If she plays Hisham Abbas's "Nari Nareen (Habibi Dah)", I am (statistically speaking) likely to kiss somebody.
posted by kitabet at 8:21 PM
3 Comments:
Damned lies and statistics. :)
Anyway, don't know if I'll show tonight...but I plan to be at the Palestinian Revolutionary Cinema tomorrow at 6. Let's coordinate.
how was this? yet another event i almost attended, but settled for drinks in the west village instead
so far a disappointment. i am hoping the egyptian documentary will be more fulfilling given my love affair with egypt.
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