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New Season of Film in Cordoba

From September 04, 2013 until December 20, 2013

Starting in October, we will be bringing the best of Arab cinema back to the big screen. We will be presenting three stirring films: The Source, about a group of women who find an infallible way to rebel against the status quo; The Green Bicycle, the first film directed by a Saudi woman, which tells the story of a fearless girl who attempts to get the bicycle she dreams of by any means possible; and The Mosque, a somewhat surrealist comedy feature film about a village that does not want to get rid of the stage decorations which it gave home to for the filming of a movie.

The Source took part in the official section at the Cannes Film Festival in 2011 and was nominated for the Palme d’Or for Best Director. It also competed in France’s César Awards in the categories of Best Actress, for Leïla Bekhti, and Best Costume Design, in 2012. The Green Bicycle, its director’s premiere work, has been very well received at international festivals: it was named Best Film at the Dubai and Venice Festivals and was nominated for the British Film Institute Awards in 2012. It was the winner in the “Directors to Watch” category in Palm Springs and was awarded at the Rotterdam Festival in 2013. As for The Mosque, it won the Bronze Tanit Prize at the Carthage Film Festival, as well as a special mention by the jury at the Festival of San Sebastián in 2010. It has also taken part in the International Mediterranean Film Festival in Montpellier and the film festival of Tetouan.

Calendar of screenings



Friday, November 8The Source
Friday, November 22 The Green Bicycle
Friday, December 20The Mosque

All of the screenings will be held at 8:00 p.m. in the Casa Árabe Auditorium in Cordoba (at Calle Samuel de los Santos Gener, 9). The films will be shown in the original language version with subtitles in Spanish. Free entrance until the auditorium’s capacity is full.

Synopsis



LafuentedelasmujeresThe Source (La Source des Femmes), by Radu Mihaileanu (Belgium, Italy and France, 2010, 136 minutes).
In a small Middle Eastern village, tradition requires women to go out and get water under the burning sun at a water source which springs near the top of a mountain. Leila, a young married woman, proposes to the other women that they go on a lovemaking strike until their husbands decide to help them out with the task of bringing water to the village.
 
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LabiciverdeThe Green Bicycle
, by Haifa Al-Mansour (Saudi Arabia and Germany, 2012, 100 minutes).

Wadjda is a 10-year-old girl who lives in the suburbs of Riyadh, the capital of Saudi Arabia. Although she lives in a conservative world, Wadjda is fun and enterprising and always reaches the limits between what can be done and the prohibited. After a fight with her friend Abdullah, a neighbor who she is not supposed to be playing with, Wadjda sees a pretty bicycle for sale. She desperately wants to get the bicycle so that she can beat Abdullah in a race.
 
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LabiciverdeThe Mosque
, by Daoud Aoulad-Syad (France and Morocco, 2010, 85 minutes).

For the filming of this director’s prior movie, Waiting for Pasolini (En attendant Pasolini), movie sets were built on plots of land rented from the inhabitants of a small town, and a mosque was built on a parcel belonging to Moha, one of the local residents. When the filming has finished, the crew leaves the village. The residents knock down all of the movie sets except for the mosque, which had become a true place of worship for the townspeople. However, for Moha this is a disaster, because it is the plot of land where he grew the crops he needed to feed his family.
 
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New Season of Film in Cordoba