38 FILMS & DVDS FROM AND ABOUT THE AND MIDDLE EAST NORTH AFRICA Tahrir: Liberation Square A Film by Stefano Savona “Soon after the first reports came about the US Premiere, occupation of Tahrir Square, filmmaker 2011 New York Film Festival Stefano Savona headed for Cairo, where he stayed, Official Selection, amidst the ever-growing masses in the Square, for 2012 Santa Barbara Film Festival weeks. His film introduces us to young Egyptians Grand Prize, 2011 Traces de vies such as Elsayed, Noha and Ahmed, spending all day Documentary Film Festival (France) and night talking, shouting, singing, finally express- 90 min | color | 2011 ing everything they were forbidden to say out loud Sale/DVD (Chaptered): $398 now $348 until now. “As the protests grow in intensity, the regime’s repres- sion becomes more violent, with the terrifying poten- tial for massacre never far away. TAHRIR is a film written in the faces, hands, and voices of those who experienced this period in the Square. It is a day-to- day account of the Egyptian revolution, capturing the anger, fear, resolve and finally elation of those who made it happen.” (New York Film Festival description) More films on Egypt For Those Who Sail to Heaven Naguib Mahfouz: A Film by Elizabeth Wickett The Passage of the Century Captures the Sufi rites of the annual Opet A Film by Francka Mouloudi Festival in Egypt. A portrait of Egyptian “Wickett has carefully portrayed the intertwining author Naguib of ancient and modern so important in Egyptian Mahfouz, the first life but often missing in Western portrayals of and still only Arab Egypt. We have the voices of the local participants winner of the Nobel as well as the voice of producer Wickett who Prize for Literature. narrates the film and provides a scholar’s analysis. “[Mahfouz] is not The result is a rich film with many levels of mean- only a Hugo and a ing.”—Middle East Studies Association Bulletin Dickens, but also a Galsworthy, a Mann, a Zola and a Jules Romains.” 48 min | color | 1990 | Sale/DVD: $298 —Edward Said, London Review of Books Living with the Past 2005 Middle East & Central Asia Politics, Directed by Maysoon Pachachi Economics and Society Conference Produced by Elizabeth Fernea 2002 African Literature Association Cairo is one of the few medieval cities in Film Festival the world that remains relatively intact. Goodbye Mubarak! This a portrait of Darb al-Ahmar, a neigh- 49 min | color | 1999 | Sale/DVD: $348 A Film by Katia Jarjoura borhood in the old city now facing a process of radical change. A Veiled Revolution The ground for the protests that would overthrow Directed by Marilyn Gaunt Hosni Mubarak on February 11, 2011, had been “LIVING WITH THE PAST documents ongoing Produced by Elizabeth Fernea laid in the months preceding the mass outpouring restoration efforts in [Cairo’s historic district of] of opposition. GOODBYE MUBARAK! takes us Darb al-Ahmar ... and does an excellent job of to Egypt during that time, in the run-up to conveying the neighborhood’s spirit and the legislative elections. We discover a revolution-in- dedication of those involved in the restora- waiting, already simmering under the surface of tion.”—Archaeology Magazine Egyptian society. 2003 Royal Anthropological Institute Film Festival (UK) Over several weeks the documentary crew travels the country from Cairo to Alexandria to the 2002 American Anthropological “The emphasis here is on the months industrial city of El-Mahalia El-Kubra, introducing Association Film Festival preceding the demonstrations that led us to ordinary Egyptians, politicians, members of 56 min | color | 2001 | Sale/DVD: $390 to [Mubarak’s] forced resignation, The first film to consider the possible the Muslim Brotherhood and secular activists— during which Jarjoura and her crew reasons for modern Egyptian women’s many of whom would soon be leading the anti- The Price of Change traveled about the country, observing turn back to tradition—the resurgence of Mubarak rebellion. Directed by Marilyn Gaunt candidates of various political stripes... Produced by Elizabeth Fernea Islamic fundamentalism, the rejection of While the young, web-savvy activists get much of who were campaigning for election to Examines the effect of non-domestic work western values—as Egyptian women the credit for the demonstrations, GOODBYE parliament against entrenched on five Egyptian women. A picture of speak out. An important document that MUBARAK! shows just how deep opposition to the supporters of the regime, many of changing attitudes toward work, family, helps place current developments in regime ran among the population. “We only have them wealthy businessmen who sex, and the woman’s place in society. context. corrupt and old leaders with nothing to offer” says profited handsomely from the govern- 26 min | color | 1982 | Sale/DVD: $248 “Provides glimpses into the lives of a variety of one angry pensioner. Another adds, “the solution is ment’s economic policies. ...[a] snap- contemporary Egyptian women... [and] sets their in the hands of our 12 million jobless kids. They shot portrait of a contemporary difficulties in the context of changes that pose need to go out, demonstrate, and overthrow the revolution.”—Video Librarian problems for the entire nation.” regime.” Within weeks, Mubarak’s opponents would 72 min | color | 2011 —Psychology of Women Quarterly be doing just that. GOODBYE MUBARAK! is an Sale/DVD (Chaptered): $348 now $298 26 min | color | 1982 | Sale/DVD: $248 invaluable portrait of Egypt on the brink of history. 2 ICARUS FILMS SEE PAGE 31 FOR ORDERING INFORMATION 3 Neither Allah, Nor Master! Tunisia, Year Zero A Film by Nadia El Fani A Film by Feriel Ben Mahmoud “Fascinating! Useful for understanding August, 2010. Tunisia is in the midst of Ramadan, On January 14th, 2011, after months of mass the Arab Spring.” —Le Monde under Zine El Abidine Ben Ali’s regime. Despite protests, the people of Tunisia toppled the the weight of censorship, Nadia El Fani films a “Instructive and constructive!” government of Zine El Abidine Ben Ali, launching —Premiere country that seems open to the principle of free- the Arab Spring. dom of conscience and liberal in its relationship to 2011 Film Festival, Islam. After all, officially, Tunisia is not an Islamic TUNISIA, YEAR ZERO records the turbulent Middle East Studies Association nation. Indeed, in an archival interview, President day-to-day events that followed. Over a nine- Official Selection, 2012 Habib Bourguiba, who ruled the country for 30 month period Tunisians drafted a new constitu- Minneapolis-St. Paul Film Festival years, affirms equal rights for Jews and Christians. tion, saw the creation of more than 110 political 2011 International Documentary parties, and embarked upon the first free elections Three months later, the Tunisian Revolution Film Festival Amsterdam in the country’s history. breaks out. El Fani is out in the field. The Arab 71 min | color | 2011 world has entered an era of radical change. Tunisia, The film tracks the social and political turmoil of Sale/DVD (Chaptered): $348 which initiated the wind of revolt, is once again a this period, as Tunisians grapple with choosing the “laboratory country” for its outlook on religion kind of society in which they wish to live. As and democracy. Islam, secularism, and the status of women become themes of the campaign, several major But El Fani also sees troubling signs that Tunisia parties emerge, broadly divided between modern- may be becoming less tolerant of non-Islamic ist parties, and the previously banned Islamist beliefs. An avowed atheist and feminist, Nadia party, Ennahda. 52 min | color | 2011 takes a provocative approach to the upheaval, Sale/DVD (Chaptered): $298 while introducing us to Tunisians, including many Eventually Ennahda emerges as the strongest, and women, to explore just how high the stakes may one of its leaders, Hamadi Jebali, becomes prime be. Could, by the will of the people, a Muslim minister. With its intimate look at the run-up to their country really opt for a secular constitution? And victory, TUNISIA, YEAR ZERO helps us understand what if it does not? the contours of the political landscape and the continuing debates in Tunisia over its future. 4 IcarusFilms.com CALL TOLL FREE: 800 876 1710 5 The Moroccan Labyrinth A Film by Julio Sánchez Veiga “With its astute selection of interviews In 1898, after losing Cuba, Puerto Rico and the and contemporary film clips, Julio Philippines to the U.S., Spain focused its colonial Sánchez Vega’s film brings to the aims on Morocco, establishing a Spanish screen a fascinating but oft-overlooked Protectorate in 1912. But Spanish attempts to conquer slice of modern colonial and military the territory were resisted by the guerrilla forces of history.”—Geoffrey Jensen, Rif leader Abd el-Krim. Thousands of Spanish The Journal of Military History soldiers died—including 15,000 during a two-week 2009 Vancouver period in 1921 known as the Defeat of Annual—and Film Festival the Spanish Army responded with aerial bombings, chemical weapons and widespread atrocities. 2008 Marbella Film Festival THE MOROCCAN LABYRINTH examines how 90 min | color | 2007 this colonial conflict served as prologue to the Sale/DVD (Chaptered): $398 Spanish Civil War, with losses in Morocco under- mining the monarchy and emboldening the “African militarists,” including generals such as Francisco Franco, who in 1936 launched a revolt against the Spanish Republic. Ironically, in order to escape famine and poverty, thousands of Moroccans enlisted in the Falangist movement and found themselves fighting for their former enemies in Spain against Republican forces. Mustapha Kemal Atatůrk A Film by Severine Labat The film features rare archive footage, propaganda films of the era, interviews with elderly Moroccan Through archival material and discussions with “Intricate and meticulously assem- combatants, their children and leading interna- historians, sociologists and biographers, MUSTAPHA bled..