Author: World Cinema Reports' Editors

Ahmad Zayeri’s film, which tells the story of a Syrian child, will compete in the 16th annual Garden State film festival in New Jersey, United States. The ‘Saad’s Olive Tree’ film is directed by Iranian director Ahmad Zayeri and tells the story of a Syrian girl who has lost his sight in an explosion when he was playing. The Iranian director’s film has so far won awards in different international competitions including the Best Short Film Award in 2017 Eearl’s Court Film Festival in London, UK and the best screenplay of the 14th edition of the Kinofilm Festival in Manchester,…

There’s no denying that women are underrepresented in Hollywood, and especially behind the camera. A 2017 study released by the Center for the Study of Women in Television and Film found that only 11 percent of the top 250 grossing films of 2017 were directed by women—up from 7 percent in 2016—and only 11 percent were written by women, a two-point drop from the year before. Those numbers are not encouraging. But women have made Hollywood history recently. Wonder Woman, directed by Patty Jenkins, was the third-highest grossingmovie of 2017 with more than $412 million. And this week comes another milestone. Hitting theaters March 9,…

The Tribeca Film Festival on Wednesday revealed the feature film lineup for its 17th edition, which is set to take place in April in New York. The festival’s closing-night film will be the world premiere of Oscar-nominated director Liz Garbus’ documentary The Fourth Estate, which follows The New York Times as it covers Donald Trump’s first year as president. That screening will be followed by a conversation with Garbus and the Times’ executive editor Dean Baquet, Washington bureau chief Elisabeth Bumiller, White House correspondent Maggie Haberman and Washington investigative correspondent Mark Mazzetti. The Fourth Estate is set to air as…

Feras Fayyad will ask you to hold your hand up to your ear, rub your thumb across the pads of your fingers, then rub it against a more callused part of your hand. He will tell you to observe the soft friction and ask, “What does it sound like? How do the sounds change?” Fayyad has spent most of his adult life chronicling the humanitarian crisis in Aleppo—a result of the seven-year-long civil war that Syrian President Bashar al-Assad is inflicting upon his own people. That incomprehensible devastation is the focus of Fayyad’s Last Men in Aleppo, nominated this…

The Cannes Film Festival forever fascinates with its flavor. The festival’s unwavering method that the French themselves are famous for, has held the festival flying high. Every January, the festival announces the chairman of its international jury. Cate Blanchett, it will be this year, the Australian actress renowned for movies like Babel, The Curious Case of Benjamin Button, Elizabeth: The Golden Age and Blue Jasmine, which fetched her an Oscar for best actress. And of course, three weeks before the festival starts, the titles are announced at a Paris press conference. This year, Cannes’ 71st edition begins on May 8,…

Maverick German filmmaker Werner Herzog, Hong Kong screen legend Brigitte Lin Ching-hsia and iconic Japanese actress Kyoko Kagawa are but three of the esteemed guests set to attend the 42nd Hong Kong International Film Festival (HKIFF), which announced its full programme today. In a sad but not entirely unexpected twist, no Hong Kong films have been selected to be part of the “Galas” section in this edition of the city’s top cinematic showcase. he festival will open on March 19 with screenings of two feature debuts: Jay Chern’s Omotenashi and Maren Hwang’s Xiao Mei. It will close on April 5 with the world…

BERLIN (Reuters) – A comedy depicting a movie director being protected by his family from a serial killer challenges stereotypes about Iran and Iranian women at the Berlin Film Festival, the director said on Wednesday. “There are strong women Pigin Iran and I chose to show them as opposed to conforming to this usual image that represents to you Iranian women as victims,” Iranian director Mani Haghighi said at a news conference after a screening of “Khook – Pig”. In the film, Hasan Kasmai, a filmmaker, starts to panic after being blacklisted and losing the actress he made a star…

This is an interview with director Maryam Goormaghtigh, who enthralled audiences in the ACID section at 2017 Cannes with her light comedy road movie Before Summer Ends, Cineuropa: You have Swiss, French and Belgian nationality (and have Iranian roots through your mother), you were born in Geneva and studied at the INSAS in Brussels. Does this mix of cultures influence your work as a filmmaker? Maryam Goormaghtigh: For this film I think it did yes, because I started working on it after wanting to reacquaint myself with Iranian culture, which I didn’t know a lot about. I was born and grew…

Nechama Rivlin, wife of Israeli president Reuven Rivlin, says she is pleased that the controversial Israeli film “Foxtrot” will be screened in France, saying she thought the movie “was full of compassion.” Rivlin’s comments came during an interview on Wednesday with Asaf Liberman on Kan 88 radio, in response to a decision by the Foreign Ministry to boycott the opening ceremony of the Israeli film festival in Paris because of the film, which was directed by Samuel Maoz. “If we are talking about movies, then I want to speak about the film ‘Foxtrot.’ I watched it and liked it a lot,” said…

Guillermo del Toro, like most of his peers who’ve managed to make some sort of mark in Hollywood, owns a house in Los Angeles. While it is located in a relatively affluent neighbourhood, and wouldn’t draw a second glance from passers-by – it could be the home of the Dursleys, as far as the unremarkable suburban exterior is concerned – it is, on the inside, a veritable house of horrors. There are entire rooms dedicated to the Mexican auteur’s favourite genres, fantasy and horror. Life-size wax figures of Edgar Allen Poe and HP Lovecraft occupy opposite corners of one room…