THE TEACHER
Director: Farah Nabulsi
Palestinian schoolteacher Basem (Saleh Bakri) grapples with personal devastation after a tragic incident involving his son. His life takes an unexpected turn when he forms a deep connection with Adam, one of his students, while also developing an unexpected bond with British social worker Lisa (Imogen Poots). Simultaneously, a high-profile American attorney and his wife seek the return of their son, an Israeli soldier held captive by a Palestinian resistance group. The group’s demand for a prisoner exchange creates tensions with authorities, intensifying the search for the soldier and drawing Basem and Adam’s neighbourhood into turmoil. Oscar-nominated director, Farah Nabulsi weaves these disparate yet interconnected stories into a gripping drama that is marked by empathy, unexpected twists, and unceasing provocations, anchored by Saleh Bakri's power-house performance.
DEAF
Director: Roy Arida
Beirut, Lebanon. Hassan is assembling wooden boards. His wife is dead. He is building her coffin. Tamara and Rami, the children, in their twenties, are helping him as best they can to fulfill her last wish: to be buried in her childhood village, abandoned for more than 20 years.
DANCE FIRST
Director: James Marsh
The Nobel Prize-winning novelist and playwright Samuel Beckett shunned publicity, living in France from his student years until his death in 1989. In a riveting performance, Irish actor Gabriel Byrne portrays two versions of the writer embodying different aspects of his personality: one racked with guilty memories and self-recrimination, the other a happier spirit who believes love and pleasure are our salvation in a grim world. These inner dialogues punctuate a series of chapters covering the writer’s life, from childhood through his move to France, where he gets a job as assistant to his mentor, James Joyce, before he joins the French Resistance in acclaimed director James Marsh's inspiring movie.
ALAM
Director: Firas Khoury
High-school rebel Tamer and his gang are mostly committed to smoking weed, messing around in class and girls but, under the boys’ teenage hedonism, there is the constant uneasiness felt by Palestinians living in the occupied Palestinian Territories. When beautiful activist Maysaa’ (Sereen Khass) joins his class, Tamer (Mahmoud Bakri) adopts an interest in politics. On Israel’s national day – commemorated by Palestinians as the Nakba, or catastrophe – Maysaa’ and her fellow campaigners plan to replace the Israeli flag flying over the school with the Palestinian flag, a symbolic act of resistance reminding everyone of the history they are expected to forget. As Nakba day approaches, Tamer has to decide whether to join the struggle for real. In his first feature, Firas Khoury adroitly combines familiar elements of other coming-of-age movies with a more serious and subtle analysis of nationalism, propaganda, the symbolism of flags and, most importantly, what freedom really means.
This film is supported by the Red Sea Fund.