Myriam Sassine

On August 4th, 2020, the catastrophic explosion at the port of Beirut leaves a large part of the Lebanese capital in ruins. In the midst of the chaos, a troubled film crew face an overwhelming decision: to continue the production of their movie or abandon it? As they face the aftermath of the catastrophe, they are torn between their firm belief in the transformative power of cinema and a deep sense of cynicism about its ability to effect change in a nation plagued by economic turmoil and societal collapse. Dancing on the Edge of a Volcano chronicles their struggles and highlights the crew's resilience as they strive to find meaning and purpose in their work amidst the devastation.

After climbing Broad Peak mountain, Maciej Berbeka learns his journey to the summit is incomplete. 25 years later, he sets out to finish what he started.

When her father becomes suddenly paralyzed, the filmmaker spends four years in between hospitals finding shelter behind her camera away from a family tragedy. Rehabilitation centers, cemeteries, love making, VR experiments, fervent prayers and voice notes are the record of a filmmaker’s journey trying to amend the impossible: finding absolution for a broken family by making her father walk again.

Members of a family quit the polluted, rubbish-strewn city of Beirut for an idyllic mountain home. However, their dreams of a utopian existence are shattered by the construction of a landfill on the boundary of their land.

Lebanon, July 2006. War is raging between Hezbollah and Israel. During a 24h ceasefire, Marwan heads out in search of his father who refused to leave his Southern village. As the ceasefire is quickly broken, Marwan finds himself under the rain of bombs and takes shelter in a house with a group of elders. Suddenly, a group of Israeli soldiers enter the first floor. Trapped in the house and hostages of their own fears, the next three days will see the situation spiral out of control.

"1982" is a life-affirming coming-of-age tale set at an idyllic school in Lebanon’s mountains on the eve of a looming invasion. It unfolds over a single day and follows an 11-year-old boy’s relentless quest to profess his love to a girl in his class. As the invasion encroaches on Beirut, it upends the day, threatening the entire country and its cohesion. Within the microcosm of the school, the film draws a harrowing portrait of a society torn between its desire for love and peace and the ideological schisms unraveling its seams. In his debut feature, director Oualid Mouaness delivers an ode to innocence in which he revisits one of the most cataclysmic moments in Lebanon's history through the lens of a child and his vibrant imagination. The film demonstrates the complexities of love and war, and the resilience of the human spirit.

Amal is 14 years old when she ends up on Tahrir Square during the Egyptian revolution, after the death of her boyfriend in the Port Said Stadium riot. During the protests, she is beaten by police and dragged across the square by her hair. This coming-of-age film follows her over the years after the revolution. As the film cuts between the unfolding current events and Amal’s rapidly changing life and appearance, we see her searching for her own identity in a country in transition. Amal is fiery and fearless, sinking her teeth into the protests and constantly lecturing her mother, who works as a judge. A girl among men, she also has to fight for respect and the right to take part, both in the street and in the rest of her life. In Egypt, even for a young woman like Amal—her name means "hope"—the choices open to her for her future are limited.

A Certain Nasser is the compelling journey of ninety years old Lebanese filmmaker, Georges Nasser, an idealist who couldn't adapt to his country's failing system but whose eyes still light up at the mention of his greatest love, Cinema.

Panoptic explores Lebanon's schizophrenia. Depicting a nation thriving for modernity while ignoring the vices preventing it from achieving its goal, director Rana Eid examines this paradox through sound, iconic monuments and secret hideouts.

When hungover Bassem wakes up by the lake shore among dead fish, his sister Youmna, whom he hasn't seen for 12 years, is there with a coffin.

Desperate to escape Lebanon and settle in Europe, Lillo buys himself a Syrian passport and is ready to appropriate the Syrian identity to obtain asylum. However, what he might not be ready for yet, is everything that comes along with being a Syrian refugee today.

The octopus believes that the hand in front of it is a prey, but it doesn't know that behind every hand, there is an arm...

Beirut, at night. Said begins his first shift as a security guard. His orders are clear: watch a bridge. However, in the heart of “the city that never dies”, the exercise is going to be more complicated than it seems.

Riad, a middle-aged man, holds a firearm shop in a neighbourhood of Beirut. When he meets up with his friends or goes hunting with them, it is often with the aim of evoking together their memories of the civil war fought in the Christian militia. They live in nostalgia for the war that impassioned their youth. Director Myriam El Hajj builds solid architectural images that interrogate — and, perhaps, over time even manage to articulate — the intimate origins of violence that never seems to depart and a past that doesn't want to let go of the present.

Nanou's first true love story comes to an abrupt end. Rajwa treads carefully into a monogamous relationship. From 2008 to 2013, I accompanied them through their stories of passion and anguish, carrying with them their determination to arrive at the heart of things: to enter the hidden crevices of love, to uncover truth, all for the ever-elusive goal of understanding the essence of their own complex personalities. I entered their world to find answers to my own questions, to use their lives as my lens into discovering new forms of love. I stand at the intersection of friendship, love and seduction, unable to express the extent of my fascination for these women.