The strain of being at the top of the DJ game
From Cannes’ Un Certain Regard 2017 comes
Beauty and the Dogs by Kaouther Ben Hania, the writer-director behind the acclaimed The
Challat of Tunis (2013). it tells the tale of a young Tunisian woman who is raped by police officers, as we come to learn from the film’s trailer. Using real-life events, Hania juxtaposes one woman’s nightmare with the crude banality of Tunisia’s hospitals and police stations, whose officials operate under the guise of lawfulness.
Another anticipated film that also premiered at Cannes is Karim Moussaoui’s first feature, Until
the Birds Return, a heartening three-part story through which he juxtaposes Algeria’s turbulent past with its present landscape.
From Palestine comes Wajib, a father-son drama about the Palestinian custom of having to deliver wedding invitations in person. It stars Saleh Bakri opposite his father, veteran actor Mohammad Bakri, who both won the Muhr Best Actor Award at Dubai International Film Festival last year, while director Annemarie Jacir picked up the award for Best Fiction Feature. “As the silent observer, it was at times funny and other times painful,” Jacir said about making the film, after she followed her husband and his father for five days as they delivered invitations across northern Palestine.
New York-based Iranian filmmaker Shirin Neshat’s Looking for Oum Kulthum chronicles the life of the legendary Egyptian singer. A filmwithin-a-film, it stars Egypt’s Yasmin Raeis, who was named Best Actress at DIFF in 2013.
In documentaries, Raed Andoni’s Ghost Hunting explores trauma and collective memory, conjured from real experiences. It won at Berlinale last year. Andoni films prisoners as they re-enact their incarceration, shining a spotlight on Israel’s mistreatment of Palestinian prisoners. In the Ruins of Baalbeck Studios, which also screened in Berlin, follows the revival of the archive of the biggest Arab film production studio.
There are three documentaries from Egypt. Ahmad Zeidan’s I Have A Picture follows the work of Motawe Eweis, one of the country’s most famous extras. Ahmed Nabil’s The City
Will Pursue You contemplates the changing landscape of Alexandria, and Happily Ever After is a post-2011 “metaphor for the disappointing trajectory of events in Egypt”, as described by its filmmakers.