EXCLUSIVE: The Arab Film Club, a popular monthly film club on Arab cinema based in London, is expanding.
Actress and presenter Sarah Agha, the club’s founder and curator, is launching The Arab Film Club Podcast, debuting Wednesday, May 1, with an initial five-episode season. Episodes will drop on Podbean, Apple, and Spotify every second Wednesday after that.
The pod’s first season will be dedicated to Palestinian cinema and highlight five different Palestinian filmmakers through intimate interviews. Featured filmmakers will include Darin J. Sallam, best known for her breakout feature Farha, which was Jordan’s Best International Film Oscar in 2022. Agha will also sit down with Bye Bye Tiberias director Lina Soualem. Scroll down to see the full season one lineup.
Agha, an actress, writer, presenter, and film curator is of Palestinian and Irish heritage. She is perhaps best known for presenting the acclaimed BBC doc The Holy Land And Us: Our Untold Stories with Rob Rinder about how the mass displacement and dispossession of Palestinians during the 1948 Arab-Israeli war changed their family’s histories forever with the founding of the state of Israel. As a writer, she has written articles and interviews for The New Arab, Middle East Eye, Backstage Magazine and GQ ME. Before working in film and TV, she read Theology and Middle Eastern Studies at Trinity College Dublin. She records regularly as a voiceover artist for The Guardian, Audible, BBC Radio 3 and 4.
Discussing the decision to launch the pod, organizers said they felt compelled to “elevate Palestinian voices” as the violence in the Middle East continues.
“Palestinians are often dehumanized and demonized in the Western media or reduced to statistics in death tolls. Palestinian cinema plays an important role in what is known as cultural resistance,” they said, adding the episode drops have been timed to commemorate the 1948 Nakba, the Palestinian term for the mass displacement during the war.
Launched virtually during the COVID-19 lockdown, the Arab Film Club has grown to significant prominence around the UK film scene, hosting in-person screenings and industry Q&A events at venues including the Southbank Centre, Glasgow Film Theatre, The Garden Cinema and the Prince Charles in Leicester Square. Selected films included features and shorts from Algeria, Egypt, the Golan Heights, Iraq, Jordan, Lebanon, Morocco, Palestine, Saudi Arabia, Sudan, Syria and Tunisia.
See the full first season of The Arab Film Club pod below.
1st May – Episode 1 – Darin J. Sallam on her film ‘Farha’
Darin J. Sallam wrote and directed the breakthrough award-winning feature Farha (2021).
Logline: “After persuading her father to continue her education in the city, a Palestinian girl’s dream is shattered by the harrowing developments of the Nakba.”
15th May – Episode 2 – Lina Soualem on her film ‘Bye Bye Tiberius’
Lina Soualem directed Bye Bye Tiberias (2023) about her mother, Hollywood actress Hiam Abbas.
Logline: “Years after leaving her Palestinian village, Hiam returns home in this intimate documentary about four generations of women and their shared legacy of separation.”
29th May – Episode 3 – Ameen Nayfeh on his film ‘200 Metres’
Ameen Nayfeh wrote and directed 200 Metres (2020) based on his experience growing up in the West Bank.
Logline: “The Israeli separation wall sits between Mustafa and his family. Denied entry on a technicality, Mustafa will stop at nothing to reach his injured son on the other side.”
12th June – Episode 4 – Annemarie Jacir on her film ‘Wajib’
Annemarie Jacir wrote and directed Wajib (2017) which stars real-life father and son Mohammad and Salih Bakri acting in the lead roles.
Logline: “A father and his estranged son must come together to hand deliver his daughter’s wedding invitations. As the pair spend the day together in Nazareth, the tense relationship comes to a head. “
26th June – Episode 5 – Farah Nabulsi on her film ‘The Teacher’
Farah Nabulsi wrote and directed her debut feature The Teacher (2023) following the success of her Bafta Award-winning short ‘The Present’.
Logline: “A Palestinian school teacher finds himself caught between his risky commitment to political resistance and the unexpected chance of a new relationship.”
