Cultures of Resistance

The Lee & Gund Foundation, producer of the Make Films Not War initiative, is a co-sponsor of the 2006 DocuDays, the Beirut International Documentary Film Festival

DocuDays was founded in 1999 with the aim of raising public awareness for the non-fiction genre as an entertaining and informative tool, and is currently the only film festival in the Arab world dedicated solely to documentaries. From November 3-11, Beirut will host thousands of visitors for film screenings as well as activities geared towards films professionals.

The DocuDays program includes both competition and non-competition sections. The International Showcase will screen 27 award-winning documentaries from around the world. The Arabic Panorama will focus on documentaries from the Arab world. The competition section will recognize Arab and international films in the following categories: Best Feature Documentary, Best Short Documentary, and Jury Special Mention.

The Beirut Documentary Encounter is a series of panel discussions about issues important to the Arab documentary film community. The first panel will include presentations by representatives from the VDR Nyon International Documentary Festival (Switzerland), the Tampere International Film Festival (Finland), the Jihlava International Documentary Festival (Czech Republic), and the Lee & Gund Foundation.

The second panel, "The Role of the Filmmaker in War Times," will highlight recent debates among Lebanese, Arab, and international filmmakers about war, particularly the 2006 war on Lebanon. What are the responsibilities of the filmmaker? Can film help end or prevent conflicts? Can it serve as an alternative means of communication? These questions and more will be discussed by participants including Arab and international filmmakers, film critics and journalists, cultural professionals, scholars, and festival directors.

The Encounter will also feature a book signing by Dr. Lina Khatib, author of Filming the Middle East: Politics in the Cinemas of Hollywood and the Arab World. Dr. Khatib's book is the first comparative investigation of how modern American cinema and the cinemas of the Arab world represent Middle Eastern politics to their audiences.