Books and publications
Index / Activities / Books and publications / We Will Always Have Beirut
We Will Always Have Beirut
December 10, 20206:00 p.m.
ONLINE
Casa Árabe’s channels on YouTube and Facebook Live.
6:00 p.m.
In Spanish.
On December 10, we will be holding the presentation of this book by Laila Hotait, a Spanish-Lebanese filmmaker and artist. You can watch the event on our YouTube channel and Facebook Live.
We Will Always Have Beirut: Cine de autor y guerra(s) en el Líbano, 1970-2006 (Cinéma d’auteur and war film(s) in Lebanon, 1970-2006, published by Ed. Akal, 2020) is an audiovisual overview of the violent episodes endured in Lebanon since 1975 and shows how films in general have formed a comprehensive and diverse ensemble that serves as a tool to preserve the intimate, collective and national memory of a country. This monograph is at once a regional historical memory that shows and reflects on how civil society, despite religious and social class differences, not only resists violence, but builds and rebuilds what it destroys.
Distanced from both silence and propaganda, Lebanese film is a form of expression that questions and makes public what happens inside homes, creating a record of the history not told on the news, about the daily life affected by political decisions in a world system that does not take the lives of regular people into account, or their simplest and, therefore, deepest desires. This book is an essential work for anyone who wishes to get a closer look at Middle East history and world cinema.
The author, Laila Hotait, will be will be presenting the work at a talk with Nuria Medina, Casa Árabe’s Culture Coordinator.
Laila Hotait is a Spanish-Lebanese filmmaker and artist with a PhD in Audiovisual Communication from the Universidad Carlos III of Madrid, and holder of a Fulbright Scholarship. Her thesis was awarded the Prize for Academic Excellence and her dissertation won the National Prize of the Spanish Society for Arab Studies. Hotait’s audiovisual career began as a correspondent for Al-Jazeera Children TV. Later, as a filmmaker, she received important international awards, including prizes from the Sundance Documentary Institute and the Doha Film Institute. Her films have competed at numerous international festivals.
www.lailahotait.com | IG: @hotaitlaila
Further information about the book on the Akal publishing firm website. You can purchase the book at our Balqís Bookstore.
Download your invitation to the event and share it on Whatsapp!
Distanced from both silence and propaganda, Lebanese film is a form of expression that questions and makes public what happens inside homes, creating a record of the history not told on the news, about the daily life affected by political decisions in a world system that does not take the lives of regular people into account, or their simplest and, therefore, deepest desires. This book is an essential work for anyone who wishes to get a closer look at Middle East history and world cinema.
The author, Laila Hotait, will be will be presenting the work at a talk with Nuria Medina, Casa Árabe’s Culture Coordinator.
Laila Hotait is a Spanish-Lebanese filmmaker and artist with a PhD in Audiovisual Communication from the Universidad Carlos III of Madrid, and holder of a Fulbright Scholarship. Her thesis was awarded the Prize for Academic Excellence and her dissertation won the National Prize of the Spanish Society for Arab Studies. Hotait’s audiovisual career began as a correspondent for Al-Jazeera Children TV. Later, as a filmmaker, she received important international awards, including prizes from the Sundance Documentary Institute and the Doha Film Institute. Her films have competed at numerous international festivals.
www.lailahotait.com | IG: @hotaitlaila
Further information about the book on the Akal publishing firm website. You can purchase the book at our Balqís Bookstore.
Download your invitation to the event and share it on Whatsapp!
For those interested in the topic, we will be offering through Casa Árabe’s Vimeo channel, the chance to watch two works by filmmaker Laila Hotait that complement the presentation of “We Will Always Have Beirut.” Both works will be open to the public until December 15.
La noche entre Ali y yo - The Night Between Ali and I
By Laila Hotait and Nadia Hotait, 9 min. and 39 seconds.
A fictitious recreation of one of the key events to have taken place in Lebanese and Levantine contemporary history: the kidnapping of 39 hostages at the Bank of America in Beirut on October 18, 1973.
Generations Art Award and Prize for Best Experimental Film at the Lebanese Film Festival in Lebanon, 2019.
Beirut... Going Back to You Is Not Painful
By Laila Hotait, 12 min.
Documentary short-subject film which explores Lebanese post-war film as a transnational, migrant cinema through works and interviews with filmmakers Ghassan Salhab, Ziad Doueiri and Nigol Bezjian.
La noche entre Ali y yo - The Night Between Ali and I
By Laila Hotait and Nadia Hotait, 9 min. and 39 seconds.
A fictitious recreation of one of the key events to have taken place in Lebanese and Levantine contemporary history: the kidnapping of 39 hostages at the Bank of America in Beirut on October 18, 1973.
Generations Art Award and Prize for Best Experimental Film at the Lebanese Film Festival in Lebanon, 2019.
Beirut... Going Back to You Is Not Painful
By Laila Hotait, 12 min.
Documentary short-subject film which explores Lebanese post-war film as a transnational, migrant cinema through works and interviews with filmmakers Ghassan Salhab, Ziad Doueiri and Nigol Bezjian.