Providence Palestinian Film Festival 2009

WELCOME TO THE FILM FESTIVAL

2009-04-05T17:44:00.001-07:00

We're so glad to have you! Please join us in celebrating these films during Providence's first-ever (and hopefully first-annual!) Palestinian Film Festival.

The festival will run April 9-15, at the Avon Cinema @260 Thayer St unless otherwise noted.

Please join us for a reception celebrating the film festival and the opening of the Capturing the Occupation photo exhibit this Friday, April 10, 7-9 at Pembroke Hall floor 0!

Check out our review in the ProJo by weekly film critic Michael Janusonis:
http://www.projo.com/movies/content/wk_palestinianfilmfestival_04-09-09_69DTTJJ_v12.17c411f.html

Check out our write-up on electronic intifada, an important english-language palestinian news outlet:
http://electronicintifada.net/v2/article10453.shtml

For a detailed schedule and more information about our films, please see the links at the side.

The Festival is sponsored by Common Ground: Justice and Equality in Palestine/Israel, a Brown student group that seeks to bring marginalized and unique voices about Israel/Palestine to campus
And, by the Malcolm S. Forbes Center for Culture and Media Studies

contact: chantal.berman@gmail.com, or joanna.abousleiman@gmail.com
Avon Cinema: 421-AVON

VOICES BEYOND WALLS PROJECT

2009-04-05T17:42:00.000-07:00

Screened as part of our Afternoon of Student and Documentary Shorts

The Voices Beyond Walls initiative was founded in 2006, when pilot digital media and storytelling workshops were first conducted in the Balata and Jenin refugee camps in the West Bank. Since then we have established a team of local and international volunteers who have conducted nearly a dozen workshops in six different refugee camps in collaboration with youth centers and young participants aged 10-16 years. In each 7-10 day workshop a team of trainers works closely with 20-25 youth from the camps in small groups to produce digital media shorts.  Weaving together original stories, drama, poetry, photography, music, and digital video these youth express their own perspectives on Palestinian history, culture and everyday life in the refugee camps, as well as their dreams and aspirations. Thus far nearly 60 digital media shorts have been produced by youth in these workshops, many of which have been screened locally and internationally.

http://voicesbeyondwalls.org/

Following the screenings of several workshop shorts, director Nitin Sawhney will speak and field questions about his work.

THE THREE INESSENTIALS

2009-04-05T17:40:00.000-07:00

Screened as part of our Afternoon of Student and Documentary Shorts

#1 – Going to Fish, Going to War
The first in a series entitled Inessential (Gaza in Three Pieces), this short film records a Gazan fisherman describing the Israeli-imposed economic stranglehold that threatens his livelihood. Once among the proudest and most skilled population within Palestinian society, Gaza’s fishermen are now its poorest. Israel has drastically reduced the nautical miles in which fishermen can make their living, leaving them with nothing to fish and little to do. In this short piece, Hussam al-Habash, a member of the fishermen’s syndicate, describes life under the siege, and common harassment and shooting incidents against Palestinian fishermen.

#2 – The Air Closes In On Us
The second in a series entitled Inessential (Gaza in Three Pieces), this short film features farmers relating the effects of Israeli blockades on their ability to farm. Long crippled by the effects of Israeli bulldozing, shelling, and sanctions, the farms of Beit Hanoun, located just four miles from Israel, have been shut down. An eerie silence punctuated by occasional Israeli strikes envelops the farm.

#3 – The Mahmoud Family
The third in a series entitled Inessential (Gaza in Three Pieces) documents the Mahmouds, a family of seven living in Bureij Refugee Camp. The medical infrastructure in Gaza is unable to adequately support the medical needs of Mounir and his sons. The family tries to live as normal a life as possible, between power cuts and aerial strikes.

Director Maryam Monalisa Gharavi visited Gaza and filmed Inessential in January 2008. She has written/directed several short films, including Psychosomatic (2005) Dreams of Wingless Flight (2003) and All About My Lover (2002). She worked on feature film projects Situation Room #2 (2005) with NY-based director Steve Staso, Security (2005) with Cannes/Sundance-winning director Rob Nilsson, and most recently on the PBS television documentary Stand Up: Muslim American Comics Come of Age (2008). She has screened her work at the Pacific Film Archive, Women of Color Film Festival, Anthology Film Archive, among others. Currently she is a doctoral candidate in Comparative Literature and Film and Visual Studies at Harvard University.

PRIVATE (2004)

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A Palestinian family with five children lives outside town, near Israeli settlements. Samia, the wife, wants to leave; so does one teen son. Mohammad, the patriarch, is adamant that he is staying. Two of his adolescent children want to fight. His is the passive aggression of non-violent witness. Israeli soldiers burst into the home, taking over the second floor. At night, the family is locked in the living room. We see the effects of the occupation on the children and on the marriage. Through the eyes of Miriam, the older daughter, we watch the soldiers from her hiding place. Jamal, the eldest son, sets a trap with a grenade. Characters call upon Allah. Chaos and death are close.

Winner of several prizes at Locarno International Film Festival

trailer : http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SdEVH1Ec2-4

Director Saverio Costanzo was born in Rome on September 28, 1975. In 2000 he wrote, filmed, directed and edited 6 episodes of a new docu-fiction set within the red room (emergency resuscitation) of the Hospital “Policlinico Umberto I” in Rome. With Sala rossa he won the special mention from critics at the Turin International Festival. Private is his first feature film.

CHRONICLES OF A REFUGEE part 4

2009-04-05T17:31:00.000-07:00

Chronicles Of A Refugee is a 6-part documentary series that looks at the Palestinian refugee experience over the last 60 years in its global context. The first three episodes recount the experiences of Palestinian refugees since 1947 in their own voices. The refugees take us from "Al-Nakba' (the catastrophe) in 1948 (Part I) through the repeated expulsions of Palestinians from, and by, host countries (Part II) to the various legal, social and political discrimination Palestinian refugees continue to experience (Part III). The last three episodes raise three main issues facing contemporary Palestinian refugees. The intended goal here is to open up debates revolving around Palestinian identity (Part IV); the Right of Return (Part V); and the problem of political representation (Part VI).

Part 4. Identity Without Homeland 78 min
Unpacks the meaning and attributes of Palestinian identity in different parts of the world after 60 years of dispossession and refugee status. Palestinians debate the role of refugee camps, usefulness of citizenship and the effect of living outside the Arab world on Palestinian identity.

trailer : http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aPyXTW3bjyI

Director Adam Shapiro is a documentary filmmaker, human rights activist and Palestinian rights activist He is also working with a colleague in an independent effort to help find durable solutions for the Palestinian refugees of Iraq. He last served as Country Director in Afghanistan for the international human rights organization Global Rights. Adam is a Ph.D. candidate in International Relations at American University, and holds a MA in Politics from New York University and a MA in Arab Studies from Georgetown University.

Adam Shapiro will lead a discussion on CHRONICLES OF A REFUGEE after the screening!

Director Perla Issa is a documentary filmmaker and human rights activist based in Beirut, Lebanon. She has volunteered with the ISM in the Occupied Palestinian Territories and with Samidoun in Lebanon during the 2006 summer war. She has worked on the documentary series “Arabs and Terrorism” (2007), and has produced short films on displaced refugees from Nahr El-Bared.

Director Aseel Mansour is an award winning Palestinian filmmaker and photographer currently living and working in Dubai at Microsoft. He has directed and produced a number of short films and has been selected to attend international film institutes on account of his work.

SLINGSHOT HIPHOP (2008)

2009-04-05T17:23:00.000-07:00

Slingshot Hip Hop braids together the stories of young Palestinians living in the West Bank, Gaza and inside Israel as they discover Hip Hop and employ it as a tool to surmount divisions imposed by occupation and poverty. From internal checkpoints and Separation Walls to gender norms and generational differences, this is the story of young people crossing the borders that separate them.

If you saw DAM's concert at Brown last weekend, they are the featured group in this documentary!

trailer : http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1rdS8zNp3ow

http://www.slingshothiphop.com/

currently under construction... check back in a few hours

2009-04-05T08:48:00.000-07:00

SALT OF THIS SEA (2008)

2009-04-05T08:41:00.000-07:00

Director Annemarie Jacir has been working in independent film since 1994 and has written, directed and produced a number of films including ‘a post oslo history’ (1998), ‘The Satellite Shooters’ (2001) and ‘like twenty impossibles’ (2003). She has taught courses at Columbia, Bethlehem, and Birzeit University. She also works as a freelance editor and cinematographer.

‘Salt of this Sea’ (2008) is her first feature film, and her second work to debut at Cannes Film Festival. Having been banned from returning to Palestine, she now lives in Amman, Jordan.

Soraya, born in Brooklyn in a working class community of Palestinian refugees, discovers that her grandfather's savings were frozen in a bank account in Jaffa when he was exiled in 1948. Direct, stubborn, and determined to reclaim what is hers, she fulfills her life-long dream of "returning" to Palestine. Slowly she is taken apart by the reality around her and is forced to confront her own anger. She meets Emad, a young Palestinian whose ambition, contrary to hers, is to leave forever. Tired of the constraints that dictate their lives, they know in order to be free, they must take things into their own hands, even if it's illegal.

Trailer: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bDRmLPGAGzI

Screening Times and Locations

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Thurs 4/9, 9pm @Avon Cinema : SLINGSHOT HIPHOP
Sat 4/11, 4pm @Carmichael Auditorium, 89 Waterman St : DAY OF STUDENT / DOCUMENTARY SHORTS
feat. discussion with Nitin Sawhney of VOICES BEYOND WALLS and THREE INESSENTIALS
Sun 4/12, 9pm @Avon Cinema : SALT OF THIS SEA
Mon 4/13, 9pm @Avon Cinema : CHRONICLES OF A REFUGEE
feat. discussion with director Adam Shapiro
Weds 4/15, 9pm @Avon Cinema : PRIVATE

Welcome!

2009-03-31T12:19:00.001-07:00

Love our festival blabla