EXPANDED CINEMA, AMPLIFIED VOICES
Curator: Matthieu Orlean
Assistant curators: Majid Al-Remaihi, Virgile Alexandre
This original exhibition, produced by Qatar Museums, presents moving images that focus on contemporary experiences of community life, recollection, transnational crossings and exile. It offers an all-encompassing, immersive experience, through a selection of films produced, co-produced or initiated by the Doha Film Institute, as well as video installations from the collections at Mathaf: Arab Museum of Modern Art and the future Art Mill Museum in Doha.
What binds these artworks together is that they explore space and time of the Arab world, Africa and South Asia through films telling stories about the past, present, future, whether rooted in social reality or dreamlike fiction. The filmmakers and video artists allow the ghosts to come and meet us in this territory ruled by imagination. The ghosts are remembrance of a resurgent past, but they are also projections on an unknown future, shaken by entangled global and personal issues.
These films don’t belong to the mass media and cultural industry. They follow their own paths, never forgetting they are and will be perceived as pieces of History, especially when coming from countries devastated by wars or suffering from a lack of tangible collected memorabilia.
For these women and men filmmakers and artists, crafting sounds and images is crucial to highlight the upheavals in postcolonial societies with depth, humanity and poetry. Without being afraid of paradoxes, they are revealing the ability to belong to multiple places and genres at the same time. This exhibition aims to be this unique agora where modernity and spirituality can merge, where science-fiction and anthropology can meet up.
The exhibition is produced by Qatar Museums, supported by Media City Qatar and co-organised by Doha Film Institute, Mathaf: Arab Museum of Modern Art and the future Art Mill Museum in Doha, in collaboration with ACP Art Capital Partners.
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Your Ghosts Are Mine – Screenings
- Daily screenings will be held from Thursday to Sunday at 3:00 PM during the exhibition period of April 19 to November 24, 2024.
- Venue: Palazzo Cavalli-Franchetti, on the 3rd floor.
- Free admissions, first come first serve.
Schedule:
Thursday 18 April:
Exhibition Opening – No Screening
Friday 19 April:
The Mother of All Lies
Directed by Asmae El Moudir
Morocco, France, Qatar
An evocative documentary offering a engrossing exploration of memory, history, and identity. Set against the backdrop of Morocco’s tumultuous 1980s, particularly the Bread Riots and Years of Lead…
Saturday 20 April
Zanj Revolution
Directed by Tariq Teguia
Algeria, France, Lebanon, Qatar
Three people on very different journeys cross paths in Beirut despite lies, oversights, missteps, dead ends and ever-present ghosts.
Sunday 21 April
Short Film Programme 1:
Night – by Ahmed Saleh (11’)
And Then They Burn the Sea – by Majid Alremaihi (13’)
In the Future, They Are from the Finest Porcelain – by Larissa Sansour & Soren Lind (29’)
Thursday 25 April
Little Palestine
Directed by Abdallah Al-Khatib
Lebanon, France, Qatar
The district of Yarmouk in Damascus, Syria, sheltered the largest Palestinian refugee camp in the world from 1957 to 2018. When the Syrian revolution broke out, Bashar Al-Assad’s regime saw Yarmouk as a refuge of rebels and resistance, besieging the camp from 2013 onwards. Gradually deprived of food, medicine and electricity, Yarmouk was cut off from the rest of the world.
Friday 26 April
A Rifle and a Bag
Directed by Cristina Hanes & Arya Rothe & Isabella Rinaldi
India, romania, Italy, Qatar
A young Indian couple of surrendered Naxalites is fighting for their children’s future.
Saturday 27 April
Nardjes A.
Directed by Karim Ainouz
France, Algeria, Brazil, Germany, Qatar
On February 16th, ten days after Abdelaziz Bouteflika announced his candidacy for a fifth presidential term, a popular pacifist insurgency erupted in Algeria. It swelled steadily into a revolution, the widest since independence in 1962. Nardjes, a young Algerian woman, joined the protests against the repression that has crippled the country.
Sunday 28 April
Places of the Soul
Directed by Hamida Issa Alkawari
Qatar
A Qatari woman travels on an environmental expedition to
Antarctica in search of hope for a sustainable future before
returning to Qatar in search of inspiration to make positive
change.
Thursday 02 May
House in the Fields
Directed by Tala Hadid
Morocco, Qatar
High in the Atlas Mountains in Morocco, life in an isolated rural Amazigh community has changed little over the past millennium. History is passed down the generations, orally transmitted by traditional bards and storytellers.
Friday 03 May
Mustang
Directed by Deniz Gamze Eguven
Turkey, France, Germany, Qatar
Five vibrant girls grow out of childhood in a family obsessed with their virtue. Their trial of strength for freedom crests into a spectacular attempt to break free.
Saturday 04 May
It Must be Heaven
Directed by Elia Suleiman
France, Qatar, Germany, Canada, Turkey, Palestine
Award-winning Palestinian auteur Elia Suleiman turns his signature observational style from Palestine to a broader world, full of comparable tension, absurdity and paranoia.
Sunday 05 May
Abou Leila
Directed by Amin Sidi-Boumediene
Qatar, France, Algeria
Algeria, March 1994. S. and Lotfi, two childhood friends, travel through the Algerian desert looking for Abu Leila, a dangerous terrorist on the run.
Thursday 09 May
The Dam
Directed by Ali Cherri
France, Sudan, Lebanon, Germany, Serbia, Qatar
World-renowned visual artist Ali Cherri’s feature debut, ‘The Dam’, is an allegorical tale set in the shadows of the imposing Merowe Dam in Northern Sudan. We follow the life of Sudanese brick-maker Maher as he toils in the sun all day—secretly escaping to the desert to work on his own personal project of similar magnitude.
Friday 10 May
Harka
Directed by Lotfy Nathan
France, Tunisia, Luxembourg, Belgium, Germany, USA, Lebanon, KSA, Qatar
A gripping and unforgettable portrait of a struggle for dignity and a cry to be heard.
Saturday 11 May
Ghost Hunting
Directed by Raed Andoni
Palestine, France, Switzerland, Qatar
Director Raed Andoni assembles an eclectic group of Palestinians to rebuild the Israeli investigation centre in which they were imprisoned – a place they never actually saw because they were always blindfolded.
Sunday 12 May
Short Film Programme 2:
Don’t Get Too Comfortable – by Shaima Al Tamimi (9’)
I Am Afraid to Forget Your Face – by Sameh Alaa (15’)
I Promise You Paradise – by Morad Mostafa (25’)
Ceuta’s Gate (Bab Sebta) – by Randa Maroufi (19’)
Thursday 16 May
Land of Dreams
Directed by Shirin Neshat & Shoja Azari
USA, Germany, Qatar
‘Land of Dreams’ takes place in the near future in a small town in America. Simin is an Iranian immigrant who works for US Census Bureau…
Friday 17 May
Faya Dayi
Directed by Jessica Beshir
Ethiopia, USA, Qatar
‘Faya Dayi’ is a uniquely beautiful, award-winning documentary that explores the widespread use of khat in Ethiopia. While Sufi Muslim communities traditionally used the khat leaf for religious purposes, it has now become a popular daily ritual across all spectrums of society and the country’s most lucrative cash crop.
Saturday 18 May
Mother, I’m Suffocating. This is my Last Film About You.
Directed by Lemohang Jeremiah Mosese
Lesetho, Germany, Qatar
An exhibition of stolen memories and open wounds, the film is a symbolic social-political voyage of a society, spiralling between religion, identity and collective consciousness—a farewell letter and furious lamentation to a mother, a land, a hero, a victim, and a martyr.
Sunday 19 May
Banel & Adama
Directed by Ramata-Toulaye Sy
Senegal, France, Mali
A touching narrative that examines the complexities of love against the backdrop of cultural and societal expectations in a remote village in northern Senegal. This Palme d’Or-nominated romantic drama film portrays the deep bond between starcrossed lovers Banel and Adama as they navigate the challenges posed by their community and traditions.
Thursday 23 May
Memoria
Directed by Apichatpong Weerasethakul
Colombia, Thailand, UK, Mexico, France, Germany, Qatar
A mesmerizing and surreal film that follows the journey of Jessica, a Scottish woman played by the brilliant Tilda Swinton, who visits Colombia to see her ailing sister. There she befriends Agnes, an archaeologist studying human remains discovered within a tunnel under construction.
Friday 24 May
Timbuktu
Directed by Abderrahmane Sissako
France, Mauritania, Qatar
Following the extremist takeover of northern Mali, a proud cattle herder comes into fateful conflict with the fundamentalist rulers of the provincial capital.
Saturday 25 May
Disappearance
Directed by Ali Asgari
Iran, Qatar
In an Iranian culture that operates within strict social mores, Sara, a university student, and her boyfriend Hamed allow their youthful naïveté to get the best of them. Now, Sara requires surgery, but because the young couple have a secret to hide, no hospital will help them. Director Ali Asgari’s film questions the lack of compassion of individuals who hold authority within the Iranian state – whether they are following the rules or exploiting the need to break them.
Sunday 26 May
Freedom Fields
Directed by Naziha Arebi
Libya, UK, Netherlands, USA, Qatar, Lebanon, Canada
Filmed over five years, ‘Freedom Fields’ follows three women and their football team in post-revolution Libya, as the country descends into civil war and the utopian hopes of the Arab Spring begin to fade.
Thursday 30 May
Ladder to Damascus
Directed by Mohamad Malas
Syria, Lebanon, Qatar
Ghalia believes she is the reincarnation of a woman named Zeina. When Ghalia is asleep, Zeina leaves her body and walks the streets of Damascus, and there she meets Samer, a young projectionist who is passionate about film.
Friday 31 May
Monisme
Directed by Riar Rizaldi
Indonesia, Qatar
In the shadows of recent eruptions, several professional actors and non-actor professionals portray a dynamic of human-nature relationships in one of the most active stratovolcanoes in the world, Mount Merapi.
Saturday 01 June
Nezouh
Directed by Soudade Kaadan
Syria, Lebanon, Qatar
A bomb falls on Zeina’s house opening for her a window to a new life.
Sunday 02 June
Short Film Programme 3:
The Black Veil – by AJ Al Thani (16’)
Al-Sit – by Suzannah Mirghani (20’)
Sh’hab – by Amal Al Muftah (13’)
I’ve Been Watching You All Along – by Rawda Al Thani (10’)
Thursday 06 June
Dirty, Difficult, Dangerous
Directed by Wissam Charaf
France, Lebanon, Germany, Qatar
Ahmed, a Syrian refugee, hopes to find love with Mehdia, an Ethiopian maid—but their love seems impossible in Beirut.
Friday 07 June
Déserts
Directed by Faouzi Bensaidi
Morocco, France, Germany, Belgium, Qatar
Set in the vast, unforgiving landscapes of southern Morocco, ‘Déserts’ tells the tale of two petty criminals, Mehdi and Hamid, who traverse the desert in their wrinkled suits and ties. Their mission? To recover defaulted-upon loans for their agency from villagers stricken with poverty and struggling with drought.
Saturday 08 June
Diamond Island
Directed by Davy Chou
Cambodia, France, Germany, Thailand, Qatar
Bora leaves his home village for the worksites of Diamond Island, a contemporary playground for the rich outside Phnom Penh. There, he finds his mysterious older brother Solei, whom he has not seen in years.
Sunday 09 June
Freda
Directed by Gessica Geneus
Haiti, Benin, France, Qatar
The compassionate story of a Haitian family, mostly women, in the context of the socio-political crisis in Haiti.
Thursday 13 June
The Cave
Directed by Fares Fayyad
Syria, Denmark, USA, Qatar
A group of female doctors establish a subterranean hospital in order to save the lives of victims of chemical and conventional weapons during the Syrian civil war.
Friday 14 June
Chasing the Dazzling Light
Directed by Yasser Kassab
Syria, Qatar
Yaser — and his father in Aleppo — decide to make a collaborative film that challenges the distance between them from Sweden to Syria. The film becomes a place for family members to meet.
Saturday 15 June
Our Madness
Directed by Joao Viana
Portugal, Mozambique, Guinea-Bissau, France, Qatar
A child helps a woman who seeks her husband all over Mozambique. When they finally find him, the child is killed.
Sunday 16 June
The Lebanese Rocket Society
Joana Hadjithomas & Khalil Joreige
Lebanon, France, Qatar
In the 60s, Lebanon launched the Middle East’s first rocket, and the nation celebrated its involvement in the international space race. In bringing this forgotten episode to light, this film revives Arab dreams buried since the Arab-Israeli conflict of 1967 – a reflection of the reawakening of hopes in the wake of the Arab Spring.
Thursday 20 June
Memoria
Directed by Apichatpong Weerasethakul
Colombia, Thailand, UK, Mexico, France, Germany, Qatar
A mesmerizing and surreal film that follows the journey of Jessica, a Scottish woman played by the brilliant Tilda Swinton, who visits Colombia to see her ailing sister. There she befriends Agnes, an archaeologist studying human remains discovered within a tunnel under construction.
Friday 21 June
143 Sahara Street
Directed by Hassen Ferhani
Algeria, France, Qatar
Malika lives alone in the middle of the desert. There she runs a small restaurant serving two dishes, omelette or tomato omelette, to those who pass through like fleeting apparitions. This place, while seemingly absent from the outside world, tells of a country and in its soul. The winds of sand and silence say just as much as the dramas and dreams of those who stop there for a cigarette, a tea, to talk, or to be silent. Malika seems to have gathered these countless stories along the way, and they are now as much a part of her as she is of them.
Saturday 22 June
The Mother of All Lies
Directed by Asmae El Moudir
Morocco, France, Qatar
An evocative documentary offering a engrossing exploration of memory, history, and identity. Set against the backdrop of Morocco’s tumultuous 1980s, particularly the Bread Riots and Years of Lead…
Sunday 23 June
Short Film Programme 1:
Night – by Ahmed Saleh (11’)
And Then They Burn the Sea – by Majid Alremaihi (13’)
In the Future, They Are from the Finest Porcelain – by Larissa Sansour & Soren Lind (29’)
Thursday 27 June
Places of the Soul
Directed by Hamida Issa Alkawari
Qatar
A Qatari woman travels on an environmental expedition to Antarctica in search of hope for a sustainable future before returning to Qatar in search of inspiration to make positive change.
Friday 28 June
Little Palestine
Directed by Abdallah Al-Khatib
Lebanon, France, Qatar
The district of Yarmouk in Damascus, Syria, sheltered the largest Palestinian refugee camp in the world from 1957 to 2018. When the Syrian revolution broke out, Bashar Al-Assad’s regime saw Yarmouk as a refuge of rebels and resistance, besieging the camp from 2013 onwards. Gradually deprived of food, medicine and electricity, Yarmouk was cut off from the rest of the world.
Saturday 29 June
A Rifle and a Bag
Directed by Cristina Hanes & Arya Rothe & Isabella Rinaldi
India, romania, Italy, Qatar
A young Indian couple of surrendered Naxalites is fighting for their children’s future.
Sunday 30 June
It Must be Heaven
Directed by Elia Suleiman
France, Qatar, Germany, Canada, Turkey, Palestine
Award-winning Palestinian auteur Elia Suleiman turns his signature observational style from Palestine to a broader world, full of comparable tension, absurdity and paranoia.
Thursday 04 July
Nardjes A.
Directed by Karim Ainouz
France, Algeria, Brazil, Germany, Qatar
On February 16th, ten days after Abdelaziz Bouteflika announced his candidacy for a fifth presidential term, a popular pacifist insurgency erupted in Algeria. It swelled steadily into a revolution, the widest since independence in 1962. Nardjes, a young Algerian woman, joined the protests against the repression that has crippled the country.
Friday 05 July
House in the Fields
Directed by Tala Hadid
Morocco, Qatar
High in the Atlas Mountains in Morocco, life in an isolated rural Amazigh community has changed little over the past millennium. History is passed down the generations, orally transmitted by traditional bards and storytellers.
Saturday 06 July
Mustang
Directed by Deniz Gamze Eguven
Turkey, France, Germany, Qatar
Five vibrant girls grow out of childhood in a family obsessed with their virtue. Their trial of strength for freedom crests into a spectacular attempt to break free.
Sunday 07 July
Zanj Revolution
Directed by Tariq Teguia
Algeria, France, Lebanon, Qatar
Three people on very different journeys cross paths in Beirut despite lies, oversights, missteps, dead ends and ever-present ghosts.
Thursday 11 July
Abou Leila
Directed by Amin Sidi-Boumediene
Qatar, France, Algeria
Algeria, March 1994. S. and Lotfi, two childhood friends, travel through the Algerian desert looking for Abu Leila, a dangerous terrorist on the run.
Friday 12 July
The Dam
Directed by Ali Cherri
France, Sudan, Lebanon, Germany, Serbia, Qatar
World-renowned visual artist Ali Cherri’s feature debut, ‘The Dam’, is an allegorical tale set in the shadows of the imposing Merowe Dam in Northern Sudan. We follow the life of Sudanese brick-maker Maher as he toils in the sun all day—secretly escaping to the desert to work on his own personal project of similar magnitude.
Saturday 13 July
Harka
Directed by Lotfy Nathan
France, Tunisia, Luxembourg, Belgium, Germany, USA, Lebanon, KSA, Qatar
A gripping and unforgettable portrait of a struggle for dignity and a cry to be heard.
Sunday 14 July
Short Film Programme 2:
Don’t Get Too Comfortable – by Shaima Al Tamimi (9’)
I Am Afraid to Forget Your Face – by Sameh Alaa (15’)
I Promise You Paradise – by Morad Mostafa (25’)
Ceuta’s Gate (Bab Sebta) – by Randa Maroufi (19’)
Thursday 18 July
Banel & Adama
Directed by Ramata-Toulaye Sy
Senegal, France, Mali
A touching narrative that examines the complexities of love against the backdrop of cultural and societal expectations in a remote village in northern Senegal. This Palme d’Or-nominated romantic drama film portrays the deep bond between starcrossed lovers Banel and Adama as they navigate the challenges posed by their community and traditions.
Friday 19 July
Faya Dayi
Directed by Jessica Beshir
Ethiopia, USA, Qatar
‘Faya Dayi’ is a uniquely beautiful, award-winning documentary that explores the widespread use of khat in Ethiopia. While Sufi Muslim communities traditionally used the khat leaf for religious purposes, it has now become a popular daily ritual across all spectrums of society and the country’s most lucrative cash crop.
Saturday 20 July
143 Sahara Street
Directed by Hassen Ferhani
Algeria, France, Qatar
Malika lives alone in the middle of the desert. There she runs a small restaurant serving two dishes, omelette or tomato omelette, to those who pass through like fleeting apparitions. This place, while seemingly absent from the outside world, tells of a country and in its soul. The winds of sand and silence say just as much as the dramas and dreams of those who stop there for a cigarette, a tea, to talk, or to be silent. Malika seems to have gathered these countless stories along the way, and they are now as much a part of her as she is of them.
Sunday 21 July
Ghost Hunting
Directed by Raed Andoni
Palestine, France, Switzerland, Qatar
Director Raed Andoni assembles an eclectic group of Palestinians to rebuild the Israeli investigation centre in which they were imprisoned – a place they never actually saw because they were always blindfolded.
Thursday 25 July
Mother, I’m Suffocating. This is my Last Film About You.
Directed by Lemohang Jeremiah Mosese
Lesetho, Germany, Qatar
An exhibition of stolen memories and open wounds, the film is a symbolic social-political voyage of a society, spiralling between religion, identity and collective consciousness—a farewell letter and furious lamentation to a mother, a land, a hero, a victim, and a martyr.
Friday 26 July
Land of Dreams
Directed by Shirin Neshat & Shoja Azari
USA, Germany, Qatar
‘Land of Dreams’ takes place in the near future in a small town in America. Simin is an Iranian immigrant who works for US Census Bureau…
Saturday 27 July
Timbuktu
Directed by Abderrahmane Sissako
France, Mauritania, Qatar
Following the extremist takeover of northern Mali, a proud cattle herder comes into fateful conflict with the fundamentalist rulers of the provincial capital.
Sunday 28 July
Disappearance
Directed by Ali Asgari
Iran, Qatar
In an Iranian culture that operates within strict social mores, Sara, a university student, and her boyfriend Hamed allow their youthful naïveté to get the best of them. Now, Sara requires surgery, but because the young couple have a secret to hide, no hospital will help them. Director Ali Asgari’s film questions the lack of compassion of individuals who hold authority within the Iranian state – whether they are following the rules or exploiting the need to break them.
Thursday 01 August
Freedom Fields
Directed by Naziha Arebi
Libya, UK, Netherlands, USA, Qatar, Lebanon, Canada
Filmed over five years, ‘Freedom Fields’ follows three women and their football team in post-revolution Libya, as the country descends into civil war and the utopian hopes of the Arab Spring begin to fade.
Friday 02 August
Ladder to Damascus
Directed by Mohamad Malas
Syria, Lebanon, Qatar
Ghalia believes she is the reincarnation of a woman named Zeina. When Ghalia is asleep, Zeina leaves her body and walks the streets of Damascus, and there she meets Samer, a young projectionist who is passionate about film.
Saturday 03 August
Monisme
Directed by Riar Rizaldi
Indonesia, Qatar
In the shadows of recent eruptions, several professional actors and non-actor professionals portray a dynamic of human-nature relationships in one of the most active stratovolcanoes in the world, Mount Merapi.
Sunday 04 August
Short Film Programme 3:
The Black Veil – by AJ Al Thani (16’)
Al-Sit – by Suzannah Mirghani (20’)
Sh’hab – by Amal Al Muftah (13’)
I’ve Been Watching You All Along – by Rawda Al Thani (10’)
Thursday 08 August
The Lebanese Rocket Society
Joana Hadjithomas & Khalil Joreige
Lebanon, France, Qatar
In the 60s, Lebanon launched the Middle East’s first rocket, and the nation celebrated its involvement in the international space race. In bringing this forgotten episode to light, this film revives Arab dreams buried since the Arab-Israeli conflict of 1967 – a reflection of the reawakening of hopes in the wake of the Arab Spring.
Friday 09 August
Déserts
Directed by Faouzi Bensaidi
Morocco, France, Germany, Belgium, Qatar
Set in the vast, unforgiving landscapes of southern Morocco, ‘Déserts’ tells the tale of two petty criminals, Mehdi and Hamid, who traverse the desert in their wrinkled suits and ties. Their mission? To recover defaulted-upon loans for their agency from villagers stricken with poverty and struggling with drought.
Saturday 10 August
Diamond Island
Directed by Davy Chou
Cambodia, France, Germany, Thailand, Qatar
Bora leaves his home village for the worksites of Diamond Island, a contemporary playground for the rich outside Phnom Penh. There, he finds his mysterious older brother Solei, whom he has not seen in years.
Sunday 11 August
Nezouh
Directed by Soudade Kaadan
Syria, Lebanon, Qatar
A bomb falls on Zeina’s house opening for her a window to a new life.
Thursday 15 August
Freda
Directed by Gessica Geneus
Haiti, Benin, France, Qatar
The compassionate story of a Haitian family, mostly women, in the context of the socio-political crisis in Haiti.
Friday 16 August
Dirty, Difficult, Dangerous
Directed by Wissam Charaf
France, Lebanon, Germany, Qatar
Ahmed, a Syrian refugee, hopes to find love with Mehdia, an Ethiopian maid—but their love seems impossible in Beirut.
Saturday 17 August
The Cave
Directed by Fares Fayyad
Syria, Denmark, USA, Qatar
A group of female doctors establish a subterranean hospital in order to save the lives of victims of chemical and conventional weapons during the Syrian civil war.
Sunday 18 August
Chasing the Dazzling Light
Directed by Yasser Kassab
Syria, Qatar
Yaser — and his father in Aleppo — decide to make a collaborative film that challenges the distance between them from Sweden to Syria. The film becomes a place for family members to meet.
Thursday 22 August
Our Madness
Directed by Joao Viana
Portugal, Mozambique, Guinea-Bissau, France, Qatar
A child helps a woman who seeks her husband all over Mozambique. When they finally find him, the child is killed.
Friday 23 August
Memoria
Directed by Apichatpong Weerasethakul
Colombia, Thailand, UK, Mexico, France, Germany, Qatar
A mesmerizing and surreal film that follows the journey of Jessica, a Scottish woman played by the brilliant Tilda Swinton, who visits Colombia to see her ailing sister. There she befriends Agnes, an archaeologist studying human remains discovered within a tunnel under construction.
Saturday 24 August
143 Sahara Street
Directed by Hassen Ferhani
Algeria, France, Qatar
Malika lives alone in the middle of the desert. There she runs a small restaurant serving two dishes, omelette or tomato omelette, to those who pass through like fleeting apparitions. This place, while seemingly absent from the outside world, tells of a country and in its soul. The winds of sand and silence say just as much as the dramas and dreams of those who stop there for a cigarette, a tea, to talk, or to be silent. Malika seems to have gathered these countless stories along the way, and they are now as much a part of her as she is of them.
Sunday 25 August
Short Film Programme 1:
Night – by Ahmed Saleh (11’)
And Then They Burn the Sea – by Majid Alremaihi (13’)
In the Future, They Are from the Finest Porcelain – by Larissa Sansour & Soren Lind (29’)
Thursday 29 August
Zanj Revolution
Directed by Tariq Teguia
Algeria, France, Lebanon, Qatar
Three people on very different journeys cross paths in Beirut despite lies, oversights, missteps, dead ends and ever-present ghosts.
Friday 30 August
Places of the Soul
Directed by Hamida Issa Alkawari
Qatar
A Qatari woman travels on an environmental expedition to Antarctica in search of hope for a sustainable future before returning to Qatar in search of inspiration to make positive change.
Saturday 31 August
Little Palestine
Directed by Abdallah Al-Khatib
Lebanon, France, Qatar
The district of Yarmouk in Damascus, Syria, sheltered the largest Palestinian refugee camp in the world from 1957 to 2018. When the Syrian revolution broke out, Bashar Al-Assad’s regime saw Yarmouk as a refuge of rebels and resistance, besieging the camp from 2013 onwards. Gradually deprived of food, medicine and electricity, Yarmouk was cut off from the rest of the world.
Sunday 01 September
The Mother of All Lies
Directed by Asmae El Moudir
Morocco, France, Qatar
An evocative documentary offering a engrossing exploration of memory, history, and identity. Set against the backdrop of Morocco’s tumultuous 1980s, particularly the Bread Riots and Years of Lead…
Thursday 05 September
A Rifle and a Bag
Directed by Cristina Hanes & Arya Rothe & Isabella Rinaldi
India, romania, Italy, Qatar
A young Indian couple of surrendered Naxalites is fighting for their children’s future.
Friday 06 September
Nardjes A.
Directed by Karim Ainouz
France, Algeria, Brazil, Germany, Qatar
On February 16th, ten days after Abdelaziz Bouteflika announced his candidacy for a fifth presidential term, a popular pacifist insurgency erupted in Algeria. It swelled steadily into a revolution, the widest since independence in 1962. Nardjes, a young Algerian woman, joined the protests against the repression that has crippled the country.
Saturday 07 September
House in the Fields
Directed by Tala Hadid
Morocco, Qatar
High in the Atlas Mountains in Morocco, life in an isolated rural Amazigh community has changed little over the past millennium. History is passed down the generations, orally transmitted by traditional bards and storytellers.
Sunday 08 September
Mustang
Directed by Deniz Gamze Eguven
Turkey, France, Germany, Qatar
Five vibrant girls grow out of childhood in a family obsessed with their virtue. Their trial of strength for freedom crests into a spectacular attempt to break free.
Thursday 12 September
It Must be Heaven
Directed by Elia Suleiman
France, Qatar, Germany, Canada, Turkey, Palestine
Award-winning Palestinian auteur Elia Suleiman turns his signature observational style from Palestine to a broader world, full of comparable tension, absurdity and paranoia.
Friday 13 September
The Dam
Directed by Ali Cherri
France, Sudan, Lebanon, Germany, Serbia, Qatar
World-renowned visual artist Ali Cherri’s feature debut, ‘The Dam’, is an allegorical tale set in the shadows of the imposing Merowe Dam in Northern Sudan. We follow the life of Sudanese brick-maker Maher as he toils in the sun all day—secretly escaping to the desert to work on his own personal project of similar magnitude.
Saturday 14 September
Harka
Directed by Lotfy Nathan
France, Tunisia, Luxembourg, Belgium, Germany, USA, Lebanon, KSA, Qatar
A gripping and unforgettable portrait of a struggle for dignity and a cry to be heard.
Sunday 15 September
Short Film Programme 2:
Don’t Get Too Comfortable – by Shaima Al Tamimi (9’)
I Am Afraid to Forget Your Face – by Sameh Alaa (15’)
I Promise You Paradise – by Morad Mostafa (25’)
Ceuta’s Gate (Bab Sebta) – by Randa Maroufi (19’)
Thursday 19 September
Ghost Hunting
Directed by Raed Andoni
Palestine, France, Switzerland, Qatar
Director Raed Andoni assembles an eclectic group of Palestinians to rebuild the Israeli investigation centre in which they were imprisoned – a place they never actually saw because they were always blindfolded.
Friday 20 September
Abou Leila
Directed by Amin Sidi-Boumediene
Qatar, France, Algeria
Algeria, March 1994. S. and Lotfi, two childhood friends, travel through the Algerian desert looking for Abu Leila, a dangerous terrorist on the run.
Saturday 21 September
Land of Dreams
Directed by Shirin Neshat & Shoja Azari
USA, Germany, Qatar
‘Land of Dreams’ takes place in the near future in a small town in America. Simin is an Iranian immigrant who works for US Census Bureau…
Sunday 22 September
Faya Dayi
Directed by Jessica Beshir
Ethiopia, USA, Qatar
‘Faya Dayi’ is a uniquely beautiful, award-winning documentary that explores the widespread use of khat in Ethiopia. While Sufi Muslim communities traditionally used the khat leaf for religious purposes, it has now become a popular daily ritual across all spectrums of society and the country’s most lucrative cash crop.
Thursday 26 September
Freda
Directed by Gessica Geneus
Haiti, Benin, France, Qatar
The compassionate story of a Haitian family, mostly women, in the context of the socio-political crisis in Haiti.
Friday 27 September
Mother, I’m Suffocating. This is my Last Film About You.
Directed by Lemohang Jeremiah Mosese
Lesetho, Germany, Qatar
An exhibition of stolen memories and open wounds, the film is a symbolic social-political voyage of a society, spiralling between religion, identity and collective consciousness—a farewell letter and furious lamentation to a mother, a land, a hero, a victim, and a martyr.
Saturday 28 September
Timbuktu
Directed by Abderrahmane Sissako
France, Mauritania, Qatar
Following the extremist takeover of northern Mali, a proud cattle herder comes into fateful conflict with the fundamentalist rulers of the provincial capital.
Sunday 29 September
Short Film Programme 3:
The Black Veil – by AJ Al Thani (16’)
Al-Sit – by Suzannah Mirghani (20’)
Sh’hab – by Amal Al Muftah (13’)
I’ve Been Watching You All Along – by Rawda Al Thani (10’)
Thursday 03 October
Disappearance
Directed by Ali Asgari
Iran, Qatar
In an Iranian culture that operates within strict social mores, Sara, a university student, and her boyfriend Hamed allow their youthful naïveté to get the best of them. Now, Sara requires surgery, but because the young couple have a secret to hide, no hospital will help them. Director Ali Asgari’s film questions the lack of compassion of individuals who hold authority within the Iranian state – whether they are following the rules or exploiting the need to break them.
Friday 04 October
Freedom Fields
Directed by Naziha Arebi
Libya, UK, Netherlands, USA, Qatar, Lebanon, Canada
Filmed over five years, ‘Freedom Fields’ follows three women and their football team in post-revolution Libya, as the country descends into civil war and the utopian hopes of the Arab Spring begin to fade.
Saturday 05 October
Ladder to Damascus
Directed by Mohamad Malas
Syria, Lebanon, Qatar
Ghalia believes she is the reincarnation of a woman named Zeina. When Ghalia is asleep, Zeina leaves her body and walks the streets of Damascus, and there she meets Samer, a young projectionist who is passionate about film.
Sunday 06 October
Short Film Programme 1:
Night – by Ahmed Saleh (11’)
And Then They Burn the Sea – by Majid Alremaihi (13’)
In the Future, They Are from the Finest Porcelain – by Larissa Sansour & Soren Lind (29’)
Thursday 10 October
Monisme
Directed by Riar Rizaldi
Indonesia, Qatar
In the shadows of recent eruptions, several professional actors and non-actor professionals portray a dynamic of human-nature relationships in one of the most active stratovolcanoes in the world, Mount Merapi.
Friday 11 October
Banel & Adama
Directed by Ramata-Toulaye Sy
Senegal, France, Mali
A touching narrative that examines the complexities of love against the backdrop of cultural and societal expectations in a remote village in northern Senegal. This Palme d’Or-nominated romantic drama film portrays the deep bond between starcrossed lovers Banel and Adama as they navigate the challenges posed by their community and traditions.
Saturday 12 October
Dirty, Difficult, Dangerous
Directed by Wissam Charaf
France, Lebanon, Germany, Qatar
Ahmed, a Syrian refugee, hopes to find love with Mehdia, an Ethiopian maid—but their love seems impossible in Beirut.
Sunday 13 October
Nezouh
Directed by Soudade Kaadan
Syria, Lebanon, Qatar
A bomb falls on Zeina’s house opening for her a window to a new life.
Thursday 17 October
Diamond Island
Directed by Davy Chou
Cambodia, France, Germany, Thailand, Qatar
Bora leaves his home village for the worksites of Diamond Island, a contemporary playground for the rich outside Phnom Penh. There, he finds his mysterious older brother Solei, whom he has not seen in years.
Friday 18 October
The Lebanese Rocket Society
Joana Hadjithomas & Khalil Joreige
Lebanon, France, Qatar
In the 60s, Lebanon launched the Middle East’s first rocket, and the nation celebrated its involvement in the international space race. In bringing this forgotten episode to light, this film revives Arab dreams buried since the Arab-Israeli conflict of 1967 – a reflection of the reawakening of hopes in the wake of the Arab Spring.
Saturday 19 October
The Cave
Directed by Fares Fayyad
Syria, Denmark, USA, Qatar
A group of female doctors establish a subterranean hospital in order to save the lives of victims of chemical and conventional weapons during the Syrian civil war.
Sunday 20 October
Déserts
Directed by Faouzi Bensaidi
Morocco, France, Germany, Belgium, Qatar
Set in the vast, unforgiving landscapes of southern Morocco, ‘Déserts’ tells the tale of two petty criminals, Mehdi and Hamid, who traverse the desert in their wrinkled suits and ties. Their mission? To recover defaulted-upon loans for their agency from villagers stricken with poverty and struggling with drought.
Thursday 24 October
Chasing the Dazzling Light
Directed by Yasser Kassab
Syria, Qatar
Yaser — and his father in Aleppo — decide to make a collaborative film that challenges the distance between them from Sweden to Syria. The film becomes a place for family members to meet.
Friday 25 October
Our Madness
Directed by Joao Viana
Portugal, Mozambique, Guinea-Bissau, France, Qatar
A child helps a woman who seeks her husband all over Mozambique. When they finally find him, the child is killed.
Saturday 26 October
Ghost Hunting
Directed by Raed Andoni
Palestine, France, Switzerland, Qatar
Director Raed Andoni assembles an eclectic group of Palestinians to rebuild the Israeli investigation centre in which they were imprisoned – a place they never actually saw because they were always blindfolded.
Sunday 27 October
Short Film Programme 2:
Don’t Get Too Comfortable – by Shaima Al Tamimi (9’)
I Am Afraid to Forget Your Face – by Sameh Alaa (15’)
I Promise You Paradise – by Morad Mostafa (25’)
Ceuta’s Gate (Bab Sebta) – by Randa Maroufi (19’)
Thursday 31 October
Places of the Soul
Directed by Hamida Issa Alkawari
Qatar
A Qatari woman travels on an environmental expedition to Antarctica in search of hope for a sustainable future before returning to Qatar in search of inspiration to make positive change.
Friday 01 November
Freda
Directed by Gessica Geneus
Haiti, Benin, France, Qatar
The compassionate story of a Haitian family, mostly women, in the context of the socio-political crisis in Haiti.
Saturday 02 November
Zanj Revolution
Directed by Tariq Teguia
Algeria, France, Lebanon, Qatar
Three people on very different journeys cross paths in Beirut despite lies, oversights, missteps, dead ends and ever-present ghosts.
Sunday 03 November
It Must be Heaven
Directed by Elia Suleiman
France, Qatar, Germany, Canada, Turkey, Palestine
Award-winning Palestinian auteur Elia Suleiman turns his signature observational style from Palestine to a broader world, full of comparable tension, absurdity and paranoia.
Thursday 07 November
Little Palestine
Directed by Abdallah Al-Khatib
Lebanon, France, Qatar
The district of Yarmouk in Damascus, Syria, sheltered the largest Palestinian refugee camp in the world from 1957 to 2018. When the Syrian revolution broke out, Bashar Al-Assad’s regime saw Yarmouk as a refuge of rebels and resistance, besieging the camp from 2013 onwards. Gradually deprived of food, medicine and electricity, Yarmouk was cut off from the rest of the world.
Friday 08 November
Disappearance
Directed by Ali Asgari
Iran, Qatar
In an Iranian culture that operates within strict social mores, Sara, a university student, and her boyfriend Hamed allow their youthful naïveté to get the best of them. Now, Sara requires surgery, but because the young couple have a secret to hide, no hospital will help them. Director Ali Asgari’s film questions the lack of compassion of individuals who hold authority within the Iranian state – whether they are following the rules or exploiting the need to break them.
Saturday 09 November
Land of Dreams
Directed by Shirin Neshat & Shoja Azari
USA, Germany, Qatar
‘Land of Dreams’ takes place in the near future in a small town in America. Simin is an Iranian immigrant who works for US Census Bureau…
Sunday 10 November
Ladder to Damascus
Directed by Mohamad Malas
Syria, Lebanon, Qatar
Ghalia believes she is the reincarnation of a woman named Zeina. When Ghalia is asleep, Zeina leaves her body and walks the streets of Damascus, and there she meets Samer, a young projectionist who is passionate about film.
Thursday 14 November
The Mother of All Lies
Directed by Asmae El Moudir
Morocco, France, Qatar
An evocative documentary offering a engrossing exploration of memory, history, and identity. Set against the backdrop of Morocco’s tumultuous 1980s, particularly the Bread Riots and Years of Lead…
Friday 15 November
The Cave
Directed by Fares Fayyad
Syria, Denmark, USA, Qatar
A group of female doctors establish a subterranean hospital in order to save the lives of victims of chemical and conventional weapons during the Syrian civil war.
Saturday 16 November
Abou Leila
Directed by Amin Sidi-Boumediene
Qatar, France, Algeria
Algeria, March 1994. S. and Lotfi, two childhood friends, travel through the Algerian desert looking for Abu Leila, a dangerous terrorist on the run.
Sunday 17 November
Short Film Programme 3:
The Black Veil – by AJ Al Thani (16’)
Al-Sit – by Suzannah Mirghani (20’)
Sh’hab – by Amal Al Muftah (13’)
I’ve Been Watching You All Along – by Rawda Al Thani (10’)
Thursday 21 November
Monisme
Directed by Riar Rizaldi
Indonesia, Qatar
In the shadows of recent eruptions, several professional actors and non-actor professionals portray a dynamic of human-nature relationships in one of the most active stratovolcanoes in the world, Mount Merapi.
Friday 22 November
Our Madness
Directed by Joao Viana
Portugal, Mozambique, Guinea-Bissau, France, Qatar
A child helps a woman who seeks her husband all over Mozambique. When they finally find him, the child is killed.
Saturday 23 November
The Lebanese Rocket Society
Joana Hadjithomas & Khalil Joreige
Lebanon, France, Qatar
In the 60s, Lebanon launched the Middle East’s first rocket, and the nation celebrated its involvement in the international space race. In bringing this forgotten episode to light, this film revives Arab dreams buried since the Arab-Israeli conflict of 1967 – a reflection of the reawakening of hopes in the wake of the Arab Spring.