Palestinian films to screen in Giza and Alexandria

On Tuesday 2 April, Kermet Ibn Haine Center, in the Ahmed Shakwy museum in Giza will screen Hany Abu-Assad's 2005 film Paradise Now. Meanwhile, in Alexandria El-Cabina Center will screen 5 Broken Cameras by Palestinian Emad Burnat and Israeli Guy Davidi. Both films won several awards and were nominated for oscars. Paradise Now won the Golden Globe for Best Foreign Language Film at the Berlin Film Festival Award in addition to several others, while 5 Broken Cameras won the World Cinema Directing Award in 2012's Sundance Film Festival. The film also won the Special Jury Award at the International Documentary Film Festival in Amsterdam in 2011. Paradise Now tells the story of two friends living in Nablus, who are recruited by an extremist group to perform a suicide bombing on an Israeli bus in Tel Aviv. The film explores the human side of a political issue through the days leading up to the two friends performing the attack. 5 Broken Cameras is a documentary of a first hand account of an attack by Israeli soldiers on the residents of a West Bank village, as they excercised non-violent resistance in the face of the expansion of Israeli settlements. The film's title refers to the number of cameras owned by Burnat, a resident of the village, that were broken by Israeli forces during the five years over which the film was shot. Burnat, an olive picker, started filming for personal reasons, before getting Davidi to cooperate with him on the production of the film. The film was funded partially by the Israeli government, in spite of the fact that it criticises the Israeli army, causing controversy among both Palestinian and Israeli viewers. Programme: Paradise Now will screen at 6.30pm in Kermet Ibn Haine Culture Center, Ahmed Shawki museum 6 Ahmed Shawki Street, Corniche El-Nil, Giza 5 Broken Cameras will screen at 7pm in El-Cabina Culture Center 11 San Saba Street, El-Raml Station, Downtown, Alexandria Source: Ahram Online