Dubai’s Cinema Akil will lend a helping hand to Lebanon with its Beirut Disaster Relief Screenings on August 14 and 15.
In partnership with distributor Front Row Filmed Entertainment and the Kuwait National Cinema Company, the art house cinema will screen Ziad Doueiri’s ‘West Beirut’ and Nadine Labaki’s ‘Where Do We Go Now?’
All proceeds from the ticket sales go to the Lebanese Red Cross relief efforts.
The initiative comes after the deadly explosion on August 4 in Beirut that left over 200 dead and thousands injured.
The incident was another blow to country that is faced an economic crisis, the COVID-19 pandemic and widespread protests by citizens.
“Both ‘West Beirut’ and ‘Where Do We Go Now’ are reflections of a Lebanese society that through unity, work to overcome the conditions of a volatile political geography,” said Front Row CEO Gianluca Chakra in a statement. “These films also carry in them the scars felt by Lebanese that have lived and survived the war.”
Chakra adds: “I am part Lebanese and spent a large chunk of my youth in school and university in Beirut. Same applies to some of our team. The place is near and dear to our hearts. Seeing the damage from that explosion truly affected us all at Front Row and these screenings with our close partners Cinema Akil are a way for me to give back to my home country. I’m confident in Lebanon’s people and in their ability to always rise above tragedy and move forward.”
‘West Beirut’ (1998) is Ziad Doueiri’s debut feature and is shot in cinema-verite style. The film chronicles the lives of a pair of school friends who enter a series of misadventures as they roam the city in the very early days of the Lebanese civil war.
Nadine Labaki’s feminist-themed ‘Where Do We Go Now?’ (2011) follows the inhabitants of a small village in the Lebanon mountains as a group of women try to ease tensions between Christian and Muslim men.
Located at Alserkal Avenue, Al Quoz, tickets for Cinema Akil screenings are priced at Dh50 plus VAT and are available online.
