This year the festival holds a lot of promise. Arab cinema is at its center with an unprecedented two films in Competition, Nadine Labaki's 'Capharnaüm' and Abu Bakr Shawky's 'Yomeddine', while there are of course quite a few other titles sprinkled among the sidebars, including Mohamed Ben Attia's 'Weldi'. A newly formed Saudi Film Council is occupying a harbor-side pavilion and offering wonderful panels (including one on Sunday the 13th at 11 moderated by yours truly and featuring Annemarie Jacir, Haifaa Al-Mansour, Lamia Chraibi and TIFF's own Cameron Bailey) as well as much welcomed Arabic coffee and dates. When I dropped by on a late afternoon I really cherished that cardamom and saffron infused shot of Arabia and the hospitality brought me back to my days in the Gulf.
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The Cannes Film Festival 2018 line-up -- UPDATED!
All of us may remember that last year's Palm d'Or winner 'The Square' was not in the original lineup announced at the press conference for the Festival de Cannes 2017. So a few more titles may come in the later days, like Sorrentino's 'Loro' -- a tricky release date for the first half of this six hour movie in Italy at the end of April is probably puzzling the festival organizers -- and the infamous Lars Von Trier. I mean, today with the kind of fascist governments that are in place all over the world, his words and behavior seem meek and subdued. And the visionary that is Cannes artistic director Thierry Fremaux I'm sure realizes that.
Personally, I'm proudest of the two Italian films in the Official Competition this year, Matteo Garrone's 'Dogman' and Alice Rohrwacher's 'Lazzaro Felice'. And of course, Nadine Labaki's 'Capernaum' and Jafar Panahi's 'Three Faces'. Not to mention the excitement at both Spike Lee and Jean-Luc Godard being in Cannes -- two grand Maestros of world cinema.
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The Qumra Diaries: The life lessons learned and great persons met, thanks to the Doha Film Institute
As of my very first steps at this year's Qumra, around the Souq Waqif, spent inside the Date Market fair and eating a bowl of fragrant Moroccan fava bean soup at a nearby restaurant, to my very last moments wandering inside the Hamad International Airport drinking an espresso with a fellow journalist, Doha gave me the very best she has to offer. And that's pretty darn sensational in a country that can count culture, fashion and heritage at the top of its list of priorities.
From the brand new, still partly in construction National Museum of Qatar rising out of the sands, and shaped like a Desert Rose, the crystallized rock that is formed when lighting hits the dunes, to the institution of the Museum of Islamic Art, where most of the Qumra events and masterclasses are held, to the leisurely, harass-free environment of the Souq itself, I felt like I was being coddled in a cocoon of culture and learning, one that would definitely remain with me for months to come.
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Apichatpong Weerasethakul talks to Richard Peña during a Qumra Masterclass
Photo courtesy of the Doha Film Institute
The Qumra Diaries: Wisdom from the Masters with Apichatpong Weerasethakul and Andrey Zvyagintsev
The great thing about an event like Qumra, the yearly industry meet-up organized by the Doha Film Institute to inspire and connect filmmakers with the world of cinema business, is that one gets to discover wonderful gems. And not only the up and coming filmmakers whose projects were featured in this fourth edition, some of which are definitely heading to Cannes! I also had the leisure to rediscover Russian filmmaker Andrey Zvyagintsev (‘Leviathan’ and ‘Loveless’ among others) and hear his insight during one of the six masterclasses, and actually uncover ApichatpongWeerasethakul, watch his dreamy work for the first time. And what a wonder that was! As Italian Maestro Gianfranco Rosi admitted to me later, I also remained enchanted by Weerasethakul’s ‘Emerald’ a dreamy look at a rundown motel, featuring flying particles and voiceovers, which I’m still working through and thinking about quite a few days later.
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Bennett Miller conducts a masterclass during Qumra 2018
The Qumra Dairies: Wisdom from a Master with Bennett Miller
When Oscar-nominated American filmmaker Bennett Miller sat down to give his masterclass during this year's Qumra in Doha, he immediately apologized for his voice. "It doesn't hurt, it just sounds bad," he admitted, about the husky sound that appeared to be a really bad case of laryngitis. Maybe they could stop a bit early, said his moderator, who instead then actually proceeded to go overtime with the talk.
Living on the edge, this idea that the masterclass could be cut short by Miller's loss of voice altogether actually added an extra layer of urgency to everything that the talented, kind, thoughtful and wonderfully candid filmmaker had to say.
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Gianfranco Rosi gave a Masterclass at this year's Qumra
The Qumra Diaries: Wisdom from the Masters with Tilda Swinton and Gianfranco Rosi
The greatness of Qumra, the annual industry event held by the Doha Film Institute to help connect, inspire and encourage filmmakers, lies in its diversity of activities. From the daily working breakfasts with some of the most well-respected festival directors and programmers, sales agents and producers to the Masterclasses with cinema greats, from its Qumra Talks to the networking sessions held each afternoon just around the corner from my hotel, there is a buzz of activity at any given moment and even a non-filmmaker like me can feel the excitement of great cinema in the making.
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Sofia Coppola (left) and Kirsten Dunst on the set of 'Marie Antoinette', photographed by Brigitte Lacombe
The Qumra Diaries: Brigitte Lacombe and the power of a photograph
I know that a Diaries series is meant to go chronologically, yet there are moments when the rules need to be broken.
For me, hearing master photographer and longtime Doha Film Institute collaborator Brigitte Lacombe talk about cinema and fashion from a photographic point of view was one such moment. I could not wait to get home and write about the pleasant afternoon I spent in her company -- along with a theater-full of attendees of this Qumra talk -- and her sister's, video photographer Marian Lacombe.
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Tilda Swinton and Cameron Bailey
The Qumra Diaries: Tilda Swinton, the Museum of Islamic Art and to Doha, with love
From the moment I boarded the Qatar Airways plane in Fiumicino, I realized I was being transported somewhere special. I also knew my journey, as both a film writer and a human being, would be a life changing one.
To begin with, the airline offers Karak chai -- a milky tea infused with cardamom or saffron to taste -- and a choice of films that included 'Murder on the Orient Express', the new version by Kenneth Branagh. Not what I would have gone to the movies to watch it but at 30 thousand feet, flying over lands and bodies of water I'll probably never set foot on or swim through, cup of fragrant tea in hand one's taste adjusts. And I even found myself crying through some of Branagh's Hercule Poirot moments.
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Elia Suleiman, photo courtesy of the Doha Film Institute
"If a director can come away from the event enchanted and inspired": Elia Suleiman and Hanaa Issa talk Qumra 2018
They say if you want to learn about something, go to the source.
For filmmakers in the Middle East, but also around the world, Elia Suleiman has long been the Oracle, the man with a knowledge to create momentous cinema, cinema that can change the world. Suleiman is the most brilliant source today of modern Arab cinema, the kind that breaks across borders and tears down the divide -- as his frequent trips to international film festivals and award ceremonies have proved.
So I thought, if it works for filmmakers, it could work for me. I shall ask Suleiman about Qumra myself, so I can unravel the mystery of this yearly event held in Qatar, under the auspices of the Doha Film Institute. I mean, the DFI has been very open and forthcoming about their week-long-mentorship-slash-industry-meet-and-greet-slash-film-connection event, but I still hadn't found a fascinating enough explanation of it in the media. One that would hold my attention and really explain the ins and out of Qumra.
Until I met Suleiman, DFI's Artistic Advisor and Hanaa Issa, Deputy Director of Qumra and Director of Strategy and Development at Doha Film Institute during Berlinale. One Sunday morning in Berlin, a leisurely breakfast talk later and now eagerly anticipating the start of Qumra in Doha, I finally understand.
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Tilda Swinton photographed by Brigitte Lacombe
Iconic Masters and golden projects featured at this year's Qumra in Doha
Qatar is the couture state of the Arab world. They watched and learned from the mistakes of all the other Gulf countries that were declared as states before them, and then Qatar set about to reinvent how we view culture, fashion, art and film. You can't watch an award ceremony these days without the presence for the Doha Film Institute in the credits of at least one of the films nominated, the Museum Authority of the peninsular state has assembled and created, and is set to unveil more beauty than my eyes can hold -- just a visit to the Islamic Art Museum will confirm my words -- and of course, the Emir's family owns some of the fashion world's most beloved brands.
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Filmmaker Mani Haghigi and Berlinale Director Dieter Kosslick
Photo courtesy of Berlinale
The Berlinale Diaries: 'The Interpreter', the phenomenal Beki Probst and enlightenment from Mani Haghighi
Thankfully, at this year's Berlinale, there are a couple of films in Competition which go against everything that a "competition film" should be. Whatever that definition is. I applaud the festival organizers for having had the courage to show them, and their continued support of indie voices.
One such film is Mani Haghigi's 'Pig' ('Khook') a wild colorful, humorous, dark and fresh ride through the Iranian film industry. Now wild and colorful, with women protagonists who run the show is hardly a definition one would typically associate with Iranian cinema and yet Haghigi manages it all.
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Lav Diaz at the press conference for 'Season of the Devil' held during the 68th Berlinale
Photo courtesy of the Berlinale
The Berlinale Diaries: Eric Khoo's 'Ramen Teh', Lav Diaz is my hero and the 'Pig' that's conquering Berlinale
When I sat with the maestro Lav Diaz for our interview for his Competition film 'Season of the Devil', he pointed to the film critics, the journalists who write about cinema, as an integral part of the filmmaking process. And I agree wholeheartedly with the genius that is Diaz, a man who, in this age of everything fast and immediate, still makes films that lull us into watching them for four and a half hours! He teaches us how to watch his cinema, and I believe as film writers, we hold a responsibility to teach audiences to find those films.
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A still featuring Noel Sto. Domingo from Lav Diaz' 'Season of the Devil'
Photo © Giovanni D. Onofrio
The Berlinale Diaries: Hulu's 'The Looming Tower' and a Lav Diaz virgin no more!
The 21st century version of the all-American question "where were you when JFK was assassinated?" is "what were you doing when the planes hit the World Trade Center?"
Some of us watched the towers disintegrate before our very eyes, our landscape changed forever, and it's a vision, a feeling we will carry inside our hearts for as long as we live. The smell throughout downtown Manhattan, the lines of demarcation -- complete with checkpoints -- between the northern and southern parts of the city but also the newfound sense of camaraderie we bestowed upon each other to merely get from day to day, is also what I remember from those days.
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Milán Csordás in a still from 'Genesis'
Photo © Genesis Production
The Berlinale Diaries: Face to Face with German Films and 'Genesis' by Árpád Bogdán
There are several films this year at the Berlinale that explore the theme of family. Or rather, set out to redefine it. In 'Daughter of Mine', Laura Bispuri asks, cinematically, just who our mother is -- the woman who physically brings us into this world, or the person who rears us? For most of us they are both within one person, but in rare cases, it's not.
Also present during this 68th edition of the Berlin Film Festival is a sub current of childhood, attempting to view this chaotic, pretty damn ugly world of ours at the moment through a child's eye view. Wes Anderson kicked that off in style with the opening film 'Isle of Dogs' and now I keep finding myself looking at what I watch from his "I don't want to grow up" POV.
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Valeria Golino and Alba Rohrwacher in Laura Bispuri's 'Daughter of Mine'
© Vivo film / Colorado Film / Match Factory Productions / Bord Cadre Films
The Berlinale Diaries: Elia Suleiman talks Qumra plus Laura Bispuri's 'Daughter of Mine'
From the fabulous women of 'Daughter of Mine' to a wondrous man, my early Sunday morning at Berlinale was spent in the company of Elia Suleiman, the Palestinian filmmaker extraordinaire and Artistic Advisor of the Doha Film Institute.
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Edith Bouvier Beale, Caroline Lee Radziwill in a still from 'That Summer' by Göran Hugo Olsson
Photo © Peter Beard
The Berlinale Diaries: 'That Summer', 'What Comes Around' and Q's 'Garbage'
I've been a fan of Göran Hugo Olsson's filmmaking since I watched his 'The Black Power Mixtape: 1967-1975' quite a few years ago. He talked to me then about having a "100 percent connection with the material" which make his films not only wonderful but deeply honest.
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The Berlinale Diaries: Karim Aïnouz, Jeff Goldblum, Bill Murray, Bob Balaban, Bryan Cranston and Liev Schreiber, oh boy!
The day started with a long, leisurely talk with Algerian-Brazilian, NYC-based filmmaker Karim Aïnouz and the two men who are the center of his latest film, 'Central Airport THF' -- Ibrahim Al Hussein from Syria and Qutaiba Nafea from Iraq. I won't talk about the film itself until it premieres tonight since the festival here in Berlin is quite strict about embargoes and more power to them for that! But I will say that some films really grow more special and important once the intention of their filmmaker becomes clear. In simpler words, sitting down with Aïnouz made his latest project wildly more interesting, because of who he is but also because of his subjects' backstories -- both refugees who are in Germany after escaping from their war-torn countries.
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Photo courtesy of Twentieth Century Fox
The Berlinale Diaries: I Love Dogs -- AKA Wes Anderson's 'Isle of Dogs' is finally here (and not a moment too soon!)
A movie festival is nothing without films and I kicked off my first full day at Berlinale by watching Wes Anderson's animated treasure 'Isle of Dogs' featuring puppets like you've never seen them before, beloved actors giving voices to fantastical dogs and a message of humanity hidden within a film that is so darn entertaining to watch, I may have to go back for seconds. Or thirds even. I know you've heard me talk like this before, but this time I mean it in a whole new and different way: If I went home today, I'd be happy, after watching 'Isle of Dogs'.
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Following the Dubai International Film Festival, Where Does Arabwood Go Now?
“Are you ready for us to make history again?!”
As I stepped into one of the magnificent Majlis — literally translating as a “place of sitting” from the Arabic — a meeting room inside the Madinat Jumeirah complex to catch up with the Chairman of the Dubai International Film Festival, Abdulhamid Juma uttered those words. I was taken aback for a moment and then I remembered that throughout the six years I’ve attended DIFF, I’ve sat down with him and together, we’ve come up with some of best questions about Arab cinema, its place in the world and its importance in dispelling stereotypes and breaking down walls.
This year, I came to DIFF with a heavy heart and I leave it still wondering if all the efforts — personal and collective have been worth it. We’ve witnessed how easily the mighty of the film stratosphere can be taken down in Hollywood when no longer of use to their business partners, destroying careers that should be looked at with respect, regardless of these men’s questionable behavior. We seem to have forgotten that “the casting couch” is a term as old as the movies themselves. Now we just “throw out the baby with the bathwater” as the old saying goes...
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PHOTO BY NEILSON BARNARD/GETTY IMAGES FOR DIFF
A view of Madinat Jumeirah on the opening night of the 14th Dubai International Film Festival
The Dubai Film Festival Diaries: Couldn’t Have Done It Without You, Madinat Jumeirah!
Anyone who has ever had to travel for work knows, deeply and personally, how important a hotel room can be.
For me, while I spent eight nights and nine days at this year’s Dubai International Film Festival, the Mina A’Salam hotel, in Madinat Jumeirah provided a home away from home, the perfect place to get away from it all and write, not to mention my very own soft place to fall. All rolled up into the perfectly glamorous package of a luxury 5-star plus hotel.
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