Visions of Struggle: Women's Filmmaking in the Mediterranean

November 2-3, 2007, Wellesley College, Wellesley, MA

This two-day symposium will illustrate the hybrid expressions of modernity as manifested in the ways of being a woman in struggle in the Mediterranean area, paying special attention to women's cinema as a form of counter-cinema and reinterpretation of women's shifting roles.

Presentation of Maria’s Grotto, a documentary on the practice of honor killings
With Director Buthina Canaan Khoury
Majd Production Co. Taybeh, Ramallah, Palestine

Friday, November 2nd: 7:30 - 9:15pm

Collins Cinema - Davis Museum, 106 Central St, Wellesley, MA

Film Screening and Discussion with Director
Co-presented with the Boston Palestine Film Festival

Maria’s Grotto (2007, 60 min.) In Arabic with English subtitles
Discussion with Director B. Khoury

http://www.wellesley.edu/Italian/FLaviosa/VisionsofStruggle/mariasgrotto.html

Buthina Canaan Khoury (Ramallah 1966) is a Palestinian independent filmmaker who established Majd Production Company in Taybeh, Ramallah in 2000. The company's main objective is to produce documentaries about various crucial Palestinian issues, focusing on women's social and political problems. Khoury received her Bachelor degree in Filmmaking and Photography from the Massachusetts College of Fine Arts in Boston, Massachusetts, in 1988. She is the first Palestinian woman to work as cameraperson, producer and coordinator covering special events in the Middle East for the European Broadcasting Union (EBU) and several well known European TV channels in Palestine. She has also worked as assistant director, documentary researcher and cameraperson in the films The Womand Next Door, A Woman of her Times: a Portrait of Hanan Ashrawi, and Youth of Both Sides. Women in Struggle (2004), co-produced with Lichtpunt in Belgium and Medea Fund, is Khoury’s first documentary as producer, director and cameraperson. Screened worldwide, the documentary was awarded two prizes, one at the Allsmalia Film Festival and one at Amwa in Virigina, USA. Produced in Arabic, it was translated in English, Flemish, French, Greek, Japanese and Italian. The documentary is distributed by Women Make Movies in the United States, and AutLook Filmsales in Austria for Europe. Khoury’s most recent documentary, Maria’s Grotto (2007), co-produced by Swiss Corporation, RTBF, NFB and UNIFEM, raises awareness about the practice of honor killings. Her new project The Revolution About Taybeh Beer (in production) is a documentary about her family business.

http://www.wellesley.edu/Italian/FLaviosa/VisionsofStruggle/