"Lyrical and uncompromising, the films of Jocelyne Saab are at once landmark works of Lebanese cinema and masterpieces of the essay film form. The poetic voiceovers of her movies recall Chris Marker, and her fragmented, diaristic images are reminiscent of Jonas Mekas. But Saab’s poetic vision, and her intimate interactions with the displaced, the exiled, and the voiceless, mark her films as uniquely her own." - Art of the Real
Opens February 27 | Photo-journalist and documentarian Jocelyne Saab grew up in Beirut and spent fifteen years covering the Lebanese war. The three films that would become known as THE BEIRUT TRILOGY are among the nearly 30 films she made during that time; they weave together documentary images and poetic essay to process how the war has changed the city she knew and her connections to it. Heartbreaking and quietly hopeful, Saab trains her camera on the people of Beirut as they persist with daily life amid the rubble.
BEIRUT, NEVER AGAIN
France, Beirut, 1976, 35 mins, French with English subtitles
Lebanese writer and painter Etel Adnan provides poetic voiceover as the filmmaker follows the daily destruction of the city. Every morning between 6 and 10am, she roams around Beirut while the militias from both sides rest from their night of fighting.
LETTER FROM BEIRUT
France, Beirut, 1978, 48 mins, French with English subtitles
Three years after the beginning of the Civil War the filmmaker returns to her city which has irrevocably changed. An epistolary film in which Saab wanders the streets, rides the bus, chats with refugees and reflects on the war's toll.
BEIRUT MY CITY
France, Beirut, 1982, 35 mins, French with English subtitles
In July 1982 the Israeli army laid siege to Beirut. Four years earlier Jocelyne Saab saw her 150-year-old childhood home go up in flames. She asked herself: when did all this begin? Every place becomes a historical site and every name a memory. Considered by Saab herself to be her most important film.
These films are presented with another program of Saab's work, her narrative feature THE RAZOR'S EDGE, opening on February 20.
The Film Center is ADA accessible. This presentation will be projected without open captions. The theater is hearing-loop equipped. For accessibility requests, please email filmcenter@saic.edu