(Photo courtesy of Panorama European Film Festival )
The Panorama of the European Film is scheduled to start today and run till 7 December in its 6th edition. The Panorama’s selection of films will be showing in Plaza Cinemas in Sheikh Zayed, Galaxy Cinema in Manial, and Stars Cinema in Nasr City.
The Panorama, which has taken place each year since 2004, has become a cinephile favourite and has shown some of the most successful European films each year. Some of the selections include films from the major festivals of Europe, including Cannes, Venice and Berlin.
Previous selections include Iñárritu’s Biutiful, Almodóvar’s The Skin I Live In, and Haneke’s Palme D’Or winner The White Ribbon. The Panorama also featured documentary films such as The Beaches of Agnés.
This year, the Panorama will extend its duration by 10 days and screenings at one more cinema. The Panorama is notable for showing all films uncensored and uninterrupted as well as for hosting workshops, debates and Q&As with prominent guests.
This year the program will consist of 6 sections; European Cinema, Documentary Rendez-Vous, First-time Directors, Education and Cinema, Panorama Classics and Short Films.
The European Cinema section is the main selection of the Panorama, featuring critically-acclaimed titles from renowned festivals worldwide. The Documentary Rendez-Vous will focus on documentaries from Europe and the Arab world and a selection of films created under the Euromed Audiovisual III program.
The third section First-Time Directors was launched last year and puts the spotlight on up-and-coming directors and gives them a much-needed space to display their work.
Education & Cinema enables students from different age groups to watch films with the aim of instilling a love of cinema as well as introduce them to debate and critical thinking in cinema within the context of the Egyptian scene.
The fifth section, Panorama Classics is a tribute to influential auteurs who have significantly influenced cinema history and a tribute to film preservation through screening restored film copies. This year, the Panorama will show Alain Resnais’ first feature Hiroshima Mon Amour from 1959.
Finally, Short Films will feature 5 short films about women in Egypt and are the final outcome of the “Women in the New Egypt” project, a collaboration between Misr International Films and the British Embassy.
A full schedule of the Panorama’s program can be seen through their Facebook page but judging by excellent the excellent selection of previous years, the Panorama is not an event you want to miss if you consider yourself one of Egypt’s cinema-literate.
