A Sad and Beautiful World (نجوم الأمل و الألم) is a Lebanon-Germany-Saudi Arabia-Qatar-United States co-production directed by Lebanese documentary filmmaker Cyril Aris. His feature film debut is a truly ambitious project: to tell a love story spanning three decades in Beirut, closely intertwined with the country’s turbulent political reality. The main characters, Yasmina and Nino, are born on the same day in the same hospital and forge a close friendship during childhood, which is cut short when she moves to Germany with her father.

Over the course of thirty years marked by passion, heartbreak and hope, their lives intertwine again and again, caught in a magnetic bond that defies the passage of time and wounds from the past. While Nino dreams of staying in Beirut, Yasmina only wants to escape. In a country that seems to break their hearts a little more each day, the two of them have to face an impossible decision: choosing love and building a family, or giving in to the need for survival.

When an unlikely twist of fate brings them together again as adults, the film—shot in 2024—takes on a surprising relevance. The reality it portrays continues to resonate powerfully, giving the story a timeliness that is as painful as it is inevitable.

After the screening, there will be a colloquium on the movie with Laila Hotait, a Spanish-Lebanese filmmaker and artist, and Karim Hauser, Casa Árabe’s Culture Coordinator.