2012-2013

04 ABOUT THE FESTIVAL

06 PROGRAM OVERVIEW

10 SPECIAL PROGRAMS

12 BLACK PEARL AWARDS

16 ADFF ALUMNI AT BERLINALE

18 ABOUT SANAD

20 PARTNERING WITH ADFF

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CONTENTS

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The opening night ceremony at the Emirates Palace Auditorium

The Abu Dhabi Film Festival was established in 2007 with the aim of helping to create a vibrant film culture throughout the region. Presented each October, the event is committed to curating exceptional programs to engage and educate the local community, inspire filmmakers and nurture the growth of the regional film industry.

With its commitment to presenting works by Arab filmmakers in competition alongside those by major talents of world cinema, the Festival offers Abu Dhabi’s diverse and enthusiastic audiences a means of engaging with their own and others’ cultures through the art of cinema. At the same time, a strong focus on the bold new voices of Arab cinema connects with Abu Dhabi’s role as a burgeoning cultural capital in the region and marks the Festival as a place for the world to discover and gauge the pulse of recent Arab filmmaking.

ABU DHABIFILM FESTIVAL

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www.abudhabifilmfestival.ae

SubmiSSionS oPEn: 1 APril, 2013SubmiSSionS dEAdlinE: 4 JulY, 2013

7Th Abu dhAbi Film FESTivAl24 oct - 2 nov, 2013

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Clauida Cardinale accepts lifetime Achievment Award from AdFF Festival director Ali Al Jabri and director of Programming Teresa Cavina

PROGRAMOVERVIEWThe Festival presents films in eight sections. New feature - length and short works compete for Black Pearl Awards in the Narrative, Documentary, New Horizons, International Shorts and Emirates Film Competition programs. Other recent films, retrospectives and restored classics are presented in the Showcase and Special Programs sections. Films in the Showcase section are eligible for the ADFF Audience Choice Award.

nArrATivE FEATurE ComPETiTionExciting and original storytelling from international filmmakers

doCumEnTArY FEATurE ComPETiTionNonfiction films that explore remarkable stories and issues in the world around us

nEw horizonS ComPETiTionA director’s first or second feature film, displaying fresh styles and challenging ideas in narrative work from around the world

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ShorT Film ComPETiTionInspired narrative, documentary and animated short films by emerging and recognized international filmmakers

EmirATES Film ComPETiTionShort films by established directors and talented emerging filmmakers from the UAE and other GCC countries

our worldComPETiTionFilms devoted to broadening awareness of significant environmental issues

ShowCASEA selection of recent outstanding feature films from around the world

SPECiAl ProgrAmSSpecial programming in 2012 commemorated the 50th anniversary of Algerian independance and its filmmakers along with a spotlight on modern Korean Cinema. Now an annual highlight, the Festival’s Family Day offered audiences of all ages the chance to explore great cinema, as well as their own creative potential. ADFF 2012 also celebrated two iconic actresses representing the cream of Arab and International talent: Sawsan Bader, star of the landmark 1999 Egyptian drama Closed Doors; and Italian legend Claudia Cardinale, featured in Manoel de Oliviera's drama Gebo and the Shadow.

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PROGRAMOVERVIEW

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richard gere attends the opening night premiere of Arbitrage

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Actor Seung-yong ryoo attends the international Premiere of Masquerade

ThE SPiriT oF indEPEndEnCE: AlgEriAn CinEmA"In celebration of the 50th anniversary of Algerian independence the Abu Dhabi Film Festival gave a salute to Algerian cinema with a comprehensive program. We showcased the best films of the first decade after independence, including internationally acclaimed and award winning titles like Ahmad Rashidi's Opium and the Baton (1969), and Mohamed Lakhdar Hamina's Chronicle of the Years of Embers (1975) along with the locally popular Inspector Tahar's Holiday (1967). Also included were Algerian production and co-production of internationally recognized films such as Costa-Gavras' Z (1969), and Gillo Pontecorvo's The Battle of Algiers (1966). The Algerian presence at ADFF this year was the strongest with two Algerian world premieres in the Narrative Feature Competition, two Algerian titles in the Short Film Competition. ADFF expresses its gratitude and appreciation to the Algerian Agency for Cultural Outreach."Intishal Al Timimi, Abu Dhabi Film Festival 2012

SPoTlighT on SouTh KorEA"South Korean cinema has undergone an incredible resurgence since the late 1990s, and the world has awakened to the multi-faceted creativity of its filmmakers. From Kim Ki-duk's meditative work Spring, Summer, Fall, Winter ... and Spring to Kim Ji-woon's homage to Sergio Leone The Good, the Bad, the Weird, to Park Chan-wook's huge blockbuster Joint Security Area, to Hong Sang-soo's beguiling comedy In Another Country and Jo Sung-hee's subtle but twisted genre exercise A Werewolf Boy, to Choo Chang-min's historical epic Masquerade all these contemporary films combined and conciliated art and entertainment for the lasting delight of our Festival's diverse audiences." Teresa Cavina, Abu Dhabi Film Festival 2012

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SPECIALPROGRAMS

BLACK PEARLAWARDS 2012nArrATivE ComPETiTion•Black Pearl Award – Narrative:

Araf/Somewhere in Between, directed by Yeşim Ustağlu (Turkey, Germany, France)

•Special Jury Award: Gebo and the Shadow, directed by Manoel de Oliveira (Portugal, France)

•Best Director from the Arab World: Nouri Bouzid (Tunisia)

•Best Actor – in partnership with Jaeger LeCoultre: Gael García Bernal, No (Chile, USA)

•Best Actress – in partnership with Jaeger LeCoultre: Franziska Petri, Betrayal (Russia)

nEw horizonS / AFAq JAdidA ComPETiTion•Black Pearl Award – New Horizons: A

Respectable Family, directed by Massoud Bakhshi (France, Iran)

•Special Jury Award: Beasts of the Southern Wild, directed by Benh Zeitlin (USA) We recognise the skills on display here in all the elements of cinematic language.

•Best Film from the Arab World: When I Saw You, directed by Annemarie Jacir (Jordan, Palestine, UAE)

•Best Director from the Arab World: Hala Lotfy, Coming Forth by Day (Egypt, UAE)

•Best Actor: Søren Malling, A Hijacking (Denmark)

•Best Actress: Golshifteh Farahani, The Patience Stone (Afghanistan, France, Germany)

•Jury Special Mention: A Hijacking, directed by Tobias Lindholm (Denmark)

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golshifteh Farahani accepts the best Actress award for her performance in The Patience Stone

CollATErAl AwArdS•NETPAC Award:

A World Not Ours, directed by Mahdi Fleifel (Lebanon, UK, United Arab Emirates) FIPRESCI Award: A World Not Ours, directed by Mahdi Fleifel (Lebanon, UK, United Arab Emirates); and Coming Forth by Day, directed by Hala Lotfy (Egypt, United Arab Emirates)

doCumEnTArY ComPETiTion•Black Pearl Award – Documentary: A

World Not Ours, directed by Mahdi Fleiefel (Lebanon, UK, UAE) Special Jury Award: Stories We Tell, directed by Sarah Polley (Canada)

•Best New Director: Lyubov Arkus, Anton’s Right Here (Russia)

•Best Film from the Arab World: Cursed Be the Phosphate, directed by Sami Tlili (Tunisia, UAE, Lebanon, Qatar)

•Best Director from the Arab World: Wael Omar and Philippe Dib, In Search of Oil and Sand (Egypt, UAE)

ShowCASE•Audience Choice Award: Saving Face,

directed by Sharmeen Obaid-Chinoy and Daniel Junge (Pakistan, USA)

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ShorT Film ComPETiTion•Best Narrative: 9 Vaccines, directed by Iair

Said (Argentina)•Best Documentary: The Hidden Smile,

directed by Ventura Durall (Spain)•Best Animation: Camels, directed by Park

Jee-youn (South Korea)•Best Animation: Linear, directed by Amir

Admoni (Brazil)•Best Film from the Arab World: The

Island - Al Djazira, directed by Amin Sidi-Boumédiene (Algeria)

•Best Producer: Till Nowak, The Centrifuge Brain Project (Germany)

•Best Producer from the Arab World: Yacine Bouaziz and Fayçal Hammoum, The Island - Al Djazira (Algeria)

BLACK PEARLAWARDS 2012

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EmirATES Film ComPETiTion (presented by Dolphin Energy)Short Narrative Competition•First Prize: Murk Light, directed by Yassir Al Yassri

(United Arab Emirates)•Second Prize: Smaller Than the Sky, directed by

Abdullah Hassan Ahmed (United Arab Emirates) Special Jury Award: The Journey, directed by Hanna Makki (United Arab Emirates)

Student Short Narrative Competition:•First Prize: 3aib, produced by Hana Kazim (United

Arab Emirates) Second Prize: Patience Salt, directed by Mohammed Ibrahim (Bahrain) Third Prize: Alteration But, directed by Hessa Al Shuwaihi and Reem Al Falahi (United Arab Emirates) Student Short Documentary Competition:

•First Prize: Dreams In Their Eyes, directed by Abeer Al Marzouqi, Khawla Al Maamari and Ayesha Al Amri (United Arab Emirates) Second Prize: The Gamboo3a Revolution, directed by Abdulrahman Al Madani (United Arab Emirates) Third Prize: Easy on Love, directed by Fatima Ibrahim Musharbek (United Arab Emirates) Best Emirati Film: Dreams in Their Eyes, directed by Abeer Al Marzouqi, Khawla Al Maamari and Ayesha Al Amri (United Arab Emirates) Best Cinematography: Murk Light, cinematography by Stijn Van Der Veken Best Script: Smaller Than the Sky, screenplay by Mohammed Hassan Ahmed (United Arab Emirates) Special Mention:

•Samaka, directed by Michael Naguib (United Arab Emirates )

•Ostora, directed by Hani Kichi (United Arab Emirates)

•New York Film Academy Aspiring Filmmaker Award Winners

•Cats, directed by Marwan Al Hammadi (United Arab Emirates)

•Enough Is Enough, directed by Aisha Al Hammadi (United Arab Emirates)

marwan Al hammadi and Aisha Al hammadi at the EFC and Shorts Award ceremony

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ADFF ALUMNI2013AT BERLINALE

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We celebrate three distinguished Alumni and UAE co-productions supported by SANAD, at their European Premiere in Berlin.

Annemarie Jacir's When I Saw You (Lamma Shoftak) Official Selection of the Berlin International Film Festival (Berlinale) - Forum

"Follow the sun and you will find home, his dad said. Follow the sun he did. Eleven-year-old Tarek grows restless at Harir camp in Jordan, as the days go by with no sign of return and no sign of his father. It pushes him to take destiny into his own hands and find the way back home, following his father’s directions. Annemarie Jacir breaks all boundaries with her second feature-length film, When I Saw You. The award-winning director brings us a story set in Jordan in 1967 about a mother and her child, who have fled across the border from Palestine to find refuge at a camp. It features one of the best cast ensembles in a film of this magnitude." Suad Shamma, Abu Dhabi Film Festival 2012

Hala Lotfy's Coming Forth by Day (Al-Khoroug Lel-Nahar) Official Selection of the Berlin International Film Festival (Berlinale) - Forum

"This eagerly anticipated drama sheds light on the plight of Cairo’s working class through the story of a girl living with her parents and nursing her sick father while dealing with life’s harsh realities. The daughter is in her thirties and still single. She doesn’t work. Instead, she stays at home to take care of her father, who is mostly unaware of the world after a stroke. It’s clear that those who have fully enjoyed their bodies cannot be submissive. But what of those, like the daughter, who have not? Can they survive the slavery of solitude and impotent acceptance of what they cannot change or embrace?" Alissa Simon, Abu Dhabi Film Festival 2012

Annemarie Jacir accepts the best Arab Film award for When I Saw You

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Mahdi Fleifel's A World Not Ours (A'lamun Laysa Lana) Official Selection of the Berlin International Film Festival (Berlinale) - Panorama

"A World Not Ours offers a uniquely intimate look at life in Palestinian refugee camps. In this remarkable example of first-person filmmaking, Mahdi Fleifel returns to Ain El-Helweh in Lebanon, where he spent his early childhood, to shine a spotlight on the

heroes and anti-heroes of this claustrophobic microcosm that houses 70,000 refugees within an area of roughly one square kilometre, inviting them to tell their stories of home, family, and friendship. In this feature debut, Fleifel masterfully captures the predicament faced by Palestinian refugees while challenging us to rethink our ideas about what constitutes belonging to a place." Özge Calafato, Abu Dhabi Film Festival 2012

hala lotfy accepts the best Arab director award for Coming Forth by Day

mahdi Fleifel accepts the best documentary award for A World not Ours

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The delegation of when i Saw You at the Abu dhabi Film Festival

TO APPLY TO SANADApplication deadlines are 1 March and 1 July, 2013. To be eligible, a film’s director or producer must be a national of one of the following countries, and a production company from at least one of these countries must be attached to the project:

Algeria, Bahrain, Comoros Islands, Djibouti, Egypt, Iraq, Jordan, Kuwait, Lebanon, Libya, Mauritania, Morocco, Oman, Palestine, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Somalia, Sudan, Syria, Tunisia, UAE and Yemen. For more information, visit www.adff.ae

Established in 2010, SANAD (“support” in Arabic) is the development and post-production fund of the Abu Dhabi Film Festival. It provides talented filmmakers from the Arab world with meaningful support from within the region toward the development or completion of their narrative and documentary feature-length films.

SANAD seeks bold and remarkable projects from new and established filmmakers with the aim of encouraging intercultural dialogue and artistic innovation while building stronger networks within the region’s film industry. It also offers year-round support and publicity for selected projects to help connect filmmakers to potential partners, funding opportunities and audiences.

SANAD-funded features presented AT ADFF 2012 •After the Battle (Egypt, France, UAE)

directed by Yousry Nasrallah•As if We Were Catching a Cobra (Syria,

France, UAE) directed by Hala Alabdalla

•Coming Forth by Day (Egypt, UAE) directed by Hala Lotfy

•Cursed be the Phosphate (Tunisia, UAE, Lebanon, Qatar) directed by Sami Tlili

•Hidden Beauties (Tunisia, France, UAE) directed by Nouri Bouzid

•In Search of Oil and Sand (Egypt, UAE) directed by Wael Omar, Philippe Dib

•Mohammad Saved from the Waters (Egypt, France, UAE) directed by Safaa Fathy

•When I Saw You (Jordan, Palestine, UAE) directed by Annemarie Jacir

•A World not Ours (Lebanon, UK, UAE) directed by Mahdi Fleifel

SANAD CINEMAFUNDING ARAB

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The generous support of ADFF’s partners was essential to making the Festival’s fifth year such a resounding success. In 2011, ADFF once again collaborated with a range of global and UAE-based companies, welcoming each into the exciting world of the best in international and Arab cinema. These partnerships ultimately help the Festival to ensure that it can continue to offer excellent, thought-provoking programming and events in Abu Dhabi.

ADFF proudly offers its partners the opportunity to interact directly with remarkably diverse audiences and to receive a high level of brand exposure through the presence of local, regional and international media, as well as to entertain clients and staff amid the Festival’s glitz and glamor.

PARTNERS

PRINCIPAL PARTNERS | الشركاء األساسيون

MAJOR PARTNERS | الشركاء األساسيون

PRESENTED BY | الجهة المنظمة

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PARTNERS | الشركاء

MEDIA PARTNERS | الشركاء اإلعالميون SUPPORTER

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Franziska Petri accepts the best Actress award in partnership with Jaeger leCoultre for Betrayal

contact@adff.ae PO Box 77935 /abudhabiff /abudhabiff /+abudhabiff

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contact@adff.ae PO Box 77935 /abudhabiff /abudhabiff /+abudhabiff

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www.adff.ae