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Film in Cordoba: “The Alleys”
November 08, 20247:00 p.m.
CORDOBA
Casa Árabe Auditorium (at Calle Samuel de los Santos Gener, 9).
7:00 p.m.
Free entry until the event’s capacity is reached.
Screening in the original language with Spanish subtitles.
On Friday, November 8, we will be screening this film by director Bassel Ghandour at our Cordoba headquarters. The session forms part of the activities of the “Country Focus: Jordan”, and after the screening there will be a colloquium. Come and see it!
Plot summary
Gossip and violence spread through the maze-like alleys of East Amman. Ali, a hustler posing as a businessman, has to keep his relationship with Lana a secret in order to avoid society’s harsh criticism. Things begin to fall apart when Lana’s mother, Aseel, is blackmailed by a stranger who films the young couple. Hoping to avoid embarrassment, Aseel quietly convinces Abbas, a ruthless gangster, to put an end to it all... but things don’t go as planned. Their lives begin to intertwine and clash not only with each other, but also with different neighbors living in the same alleys.
Director’s comments: “I have always been drawn to life in close-knit neighborhoods, hives which are both intimate and claustrophobic all at once. The Jabal al-Natheef neighborhood is precisely like that. So I dived deep into it with my friend Mahmoud Abu Farha, who is from the area and the associate producer of this film, in order to carry out some research. I discovered a world with many stories to be told, where tales are whispered along alleyway and gossip grows tainted before it reaches the ears of the local inhabitants. So I wrote the film as if it were one of these stories, embellished and twisted like the tales I had heard, but faithful in spirit. The result is a mix of authenticity and entertainment, like gossip itself.”
Bassel Ghandour is a screenwriter, producer and director. In the past, he co-wrote and produced “Theeb,” a 2016 nominee for Best Foreign Language Film at both the Academy Awards and BAFTA. He graduated from the University of Southern California (USC) School of Cinematic Arts. His screenplay for “The Alleys” was selected for the Rawi, EAVE workshops and Sorfond Pitching Forum. The film marks his debut as a director. After the screening, there will be a colloquium moderated by Elena Calvo Polo, holder of a degree in Audiovisual Communication from the Universidad Complutense de Madrid.
Gossip and violence spread through the maze-like alleys of East Amman. Ali, a hustler posing as a businessman, has to keep his relationship with Lana a secret in order to avoid society’s harsh criticism. Things begin to fall apart when Lana’s mother, Aseel, is blackmailed by a stranger who films the young couple. Hoping to avoid embarrassment, Aseel quietly convinces Abbas, a ruthless gangster, to put an end to it all... but things don’t go as planned. Their lives begin to intertwine and clash not only with each other, but also with different neighbors living in the same alleys.
Director’s comments: “I have always been drawn to life in close-knit neighborhoods, hives which are both intimate and claustrophobic all at once. The Jabal al-Natheef neighborhood is precisely like that. So I dived deep into it with my friend Mahmoud Abu Farha, who is from the area and the associate producer of this film, in order to carry out some research. I discovered a world with many stories to be told, where tales are whispered along alleyway and gossip grows tainted before it reaches the ears of the local inhabitants. So I wrote the film as if it were one of these stories, embellished and twisted like the tales I had heard, but faithful in spirit. The result is a mix of authenticity and entertainment, like gossip itself.”
Bassel Ghandour is a screenwriter, producer and director. In the past, he co-wrote and produced “Theeb,” a 2016 nominee for Best Foreign Language Film at both the Academy Awards and BAFTA. He graduated from the University of Southern California (USC) School of Cinematic Arts. His screenplay for “The Alleys” was selected for the Rawi, EAVE workshops and Sorfond Pitching Forum. The film marks his debut as a director. After the screening, there will be a colloquium moderated by Elena Calvo Polo, holder of a degree in Audiovisual Communication from the Universidad Complutense de Madrid.
Movie poster