Middle East & Central Asia in Venice film festival
The best films of Middle East & Central Asia
Afghanistan, Azerbaijan, Bahrain, Egypt, Georgia, Iran, Iraq, Jordan, Kazakhstan, Kuwait, Lebanon, Oman, Palestine, Qatar, Syria, Saudi Arabia, Turkey, Turkmenistan, Tajikistan, United Arab Emirates, Uzbekistan, Yemen
Afghanistan, Azerbaijan, Bahrain, Egypt, Georgia, Iran, Iraq, Jordan, Kazakhstan, Kuwait, Lebanon, Oman, Palestine, Qatar, Syria, Saudi Arabia, Turkey, Turkmenistan, Tajikistan, United Arab Emirates, Uzbekistan, Yemen
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128 titles
- DirectorSoudade KaadanStarsSawsan ArshidReham AlkassarSamer IsmailIn Syria in 2012 a mother ventures into a war zone to find a gas cylinder so she can prepare a meal for her son. She discovers that in the besieged area the people there have lost their shadows.
- DirectorMostafa SayariStarsMajid AghaKarimiReza BakhtiarinikNader FallahA family of four persons go to a remote village to bury their dead father there according to his will. But no one of them has heard anything about this village or visited it before.
- DirectorYaron ShaniStarsBar GottfriedLaliv SivanReni HalabiA young musician is secretly in love with the beautiful woman living across the street. He is unaware of the horrifying mental crisis she is going through. She is oblivious to the heavy price he had to pay when he gave up his dreams. The encounter between them will entwine their fates forever.
- DirectorSameh ZoabiStarsKais NashifLubna AzabalYaniv BitonSalam is a consultant on a popular Palestinian TV series filmed in Ramallah who rather stupidly runs afoul of an Israeli checkpoint commander who uses his military influence to begin to manipulate Salam and the writing of the show.
- DirectorMahmut Fazil CoskunStarsAli Seçkiner AliciTarhan KaragözMurat KiliçThe night long journey of the 4 soldiers discharged from the army.
- DirectorEmir BaigazinStarsZhalgas KlanovZhasulan UserbayevRuslan UserbayevA portrait of five brothers living on a farm on the Kazakh plains, where the sudden intrusion of the modern world brings corruption, temptation and deceit.
- DirectorEldar ShibanovStarsAisulu AzimbayevaChingiz KapinVictoria MukhamedzhanovaThe story of love and growing up of a 30-year-old food photographer in a small art studio during the 'Red level of terrorist threat'.
- DirectorSaeed Al BatalGhiath AyoubIn 2011, twenty-year-old Saeed, an engineering student, left Damascus for Douma (eastern Ghouta) and took part in the Syrian revolution. He will be joined later by his friend Milad, a painter and sculptor, then a student of fine arts in Damascus. In Duma liberated by rebels, revolutionary enthusiasm wins youth, then it is war and siege. For more than four years, Saeed and Milad film a daily newspaper punctuated by bombings, children who grow in the ruins we graze, laughter, a sniper who thinks of his mother, music, death, madness, youth, trouble, life. Radiography of an unsubmissive territory, a look of exceptional density on the war in a movement of cinema and humanity striking.
- DirectorHaifaa Al-MansourStarsMila Al ZahraniDae Al HilaliNora Al AwadA determined young Saudi doctor's surprise run for office in the local city elections sweeps up her family and community as they struggle to accept their town's first female candidate.
- DirectorSaeed RoustayiStarsPayman MaadiNavid MohammadzadehParinaz IzadyarThe police are after a drug lord named Naser Khakzad, but when they finally manage to catch him, he tries whatever he can think of to escape and save his family.
- DirectorSahraa KarimiStarsArezoo AriapoorFereshta AfsharHasiba Ebrahimi3 Afghan women from different backgrounds in Kabul face challenges: neglected pregnant Hava; educated Maryam facing divorce while pregnant; and teenage Ayesha marrying her cousin after her boyfriend leaves her pregnant. All by themselves.
- DirectorMehdi BarsaouiStarsSami BouajilaNajla Ben AbdallahYoussef Khemiri11 year old Aziz needs a liver transplant after being seriously injured during a terrorist ambush while on holiday in 2011. At the hospital a family secret will be revealed.
- DirectorZain DuraieStarsMaria ZreikZiad BakriNibal Al AwadiSalam's dream of becoming a mother shatters when she finds out that she is unable to have children with her husband. A lifetime of convictions and beliefs are put to the test as Salam realizes she must make a choice.
- DirectorSamuel MaozStarsLior AshkenaziSarah AdlerYonatan ShirayA troubled family must face the facts when something goes terribly wrong at their son's desolate military post.
- DirectorAi WeiweiStarsIsraa AbboudHiba AbedRami Abu SondosHuman Flow is director and artist Ai Weiwei's detailed and heartbreaking exploration into the global refugee crisis.
- DirectorZiad DoueiriStarsAdel KaramKamel El BashaCamille SalamehAfter an emotional exchange between a Lebanese Christian and a Palestinian refugee escalates, the men end up in a court case that gets national attention.
- DirectorAli AsgariStarsNazanin AhmadiPedram AnsariSadaf AsgariDuring a dramatic night, two young lovers run from hospital to hospital seeking for an help for some complications after their first time. They'll have to confront with the indifference of some doctors and avoid them to call their parents.
- DirectorEmre YeksanStarsUlas Tuna AstepeDamla ArdalMerve DizdarSelim doesn't seem able to pick up where he left off. He roams aimlessly through the city, has sex with a married former girlfriend and watches as his affluent father's company is threatened with bankruptcy. But while the stink of a burning oil tanker drives a lot of people out of town, Selim seems to be one of the few who doesn't mind.
- DirectorVahid JalilvandStarsNavid MohammadzadehAmir AghaeeHediyeh TehraniWhen Dr. Kaveh Nariman, a forensic pathologist, comes to work he encounters a corpse that looks familiar.
- DirectorAmichai GreenbergStarsOri PfefferRivka GurHagit DasbergYoel, a meticulous historian leading a significant debate against holocaust deniers, discovers that his mother carries a false identity. A mystery about a man who is willing to risk everything to discover the truth.
- DirectorTzahi GradStarsTzahi GradAla DakkaOsnat FishmanA comedy about a family man and his foreign worker who is facing unbased accusations.
- DirectorMazen KhaledStarsCarol AbboudHadi Bou AyashMoustafa FahsA young man's tragic death at Beirut's seaside causes his friends to grapple with loss and to partake in his community's rites and ceremonies, exposing the city's schisms and its society's fault lines.
- DirectorSavi GabizonStarsElla ArmonyShai AviviShmil Ben AriA middle-aged Israeli bachelor is forced to evaluate his life choices when he discovers an ex-girlfriend had given birth to his son 20 years before, in this affecting drama from writer director Savi Gabizon.
- DirectorShirin NeshatShoja AzariStarsNeda RahmanianYasmin RaeisMehdi MoinzadehA film within a film, "Looking for Oum Kulthum" is the plight of an Iranian woman artist/filmmaker living in exile, as she embarks on capturing the life and art of the legendary female singer of the Arab world, Oum Kulthum. Through her difficult journey, not unlike her heroine's, she must face the struggles and sacrifices, and the price that a woman must pay if she dares to cross the lines of a conservative male-dominated society.
- DirectorAlaeddine SlimStarsJahwar SoudaniFethi AkkariJihed FourtiN is coming from the desert to reach North Africa and make an illegal crossing to Europe. He steals a boat, but it soon sinks into the middle of the sea, then embarks in an imaginary surrealistic odyssey where he makes intense and fleeting encounters, and rediscovers his relationship with nature.