Mizna's Twin Cities Arab Film Festival

As Mizna marks our 25th organizational anniversary, the 18th Twin Cities Arab Film Festival returns September 25-29, 2024 at the Main Cinema in Minneapolis with a closing day of special films, programs, and a reception at the Walker Art Center. Anchored by stories from Palestine and Sudan, the 2024 festival brings programming that responds to the catastrophic state faced by much of the SWANA region.

Schedule of Events:

12:00pm: Three Promises

Three Promises is the story of a mother and her camera, of a son and his suppressed memories, and of Palestine. In  the early 2000s, while the Israeli army retaliates against the Second Intifada in the West Bank, Suha films her daily family life, punctuated by frequent trips underground and overwhelmed by the anguish of her two young children. At every moment of intense danger, she promises God that she will leave if they survive. In 2017, her son discovers this archive of footage and reconnects with this suppressed past, wondering alongside his mother what drove her to record their suffering and why she delayed fleeing. While on the surface the film depicts a portrait of everyday life in times of war, on a deeper level, it presents the staggering beauty of a mother's love. Blending the voice of the present with impressive family footage, Yousef completes the story his mother began, thus averting the act of forgetting on a personal and collective level.

Pal/imp/sest

A choir of witnesses revisits a disrupted mourning session. The polyphonic narration in pal/imp/sest oscillates between absurd, profound, and found personal stories and footage, all reflecting on how grief rituals manifest. The film examines a series of ruptures, possessions, and dispossessions, regarding and presenting each as geopoetic witnessing of colliding and entangled histories, traumas, and bodies through unfolding violence on Onondaga land, as well as in Afghanistan and Gaza.

The Poem We Sang

An experimental documentary that meditates on love and longing-the love of one's family and the longing for one's home-The Poem We Sang contemplates overcoming the trauma of loss and forced migration by transforming lifelong regrets into a healing journey of creative catharsis and bearing witness. A personal archive that exposes and documents collective memories and experiences, The Poem We Sang edits together family photos, recordings, and stories into a visually rich and layered tapestry.

2:30pm: A Fidai Film

In the summer of 1982, the Israeli army invaded Beirut. They raided the Palestinian Research Center and looted its entire archive. The archive contained historical documents related to, from, and about Palestine, including a collection of still and moving images. Starting with the premise of the plundered image, A Fidai Film explores the visual memory of this looting and re-appropriates images now in the hands of Israeli archivists.

UNDR

Helicopter footage examines the desert, surveying ancient natural formations and human interventions. Dynamite changes the face of the land. Farmers work their fields. Children play hide-and-seek. Employing archival footage, UNDR constructs an eerie narrative of calculated incursion. The film reminds its viewers that Palestine remains a land subjected to aerial surveillance that seeks to appropriate the landscape.

Venue: The Main Cinema, 115 SE Main St, Minneapolis, MN

5:00pm: No Other Land

Basel Adra, a young Palestinian activist from Masafer Yatta, has been fighting his community's mass expulsion by the Israeli occupation since childhood. Basel documents the gradual erasure of Masafer Yatta, as soldiers destroy the homes of families-the largest single act of forced transfer ever carried out in the occupied West Bank. He crosses paths with Yuval, an Israeli journalist who joins his struggle, and for over half a decade they fight against the expulsion while growing closer. Their complex bond is haunted by the extreme inequality between them: Basel, living under a brutal military occupation, and Yuval, unrestricted and free. This film was co-created by a Palestinian-Israeli collective of four young activists  during one of the darkest, most terrifying times in the region as an act of creative resistance to Apartheid and a search for a path toward equality and justice.

7:00pm: To a Land Unknown

Chatila and Reda are saving to pay for fake passports to get out of Athens. But when Reda loses their hard-earned cash to his dangerous drug addiction, Chatila hatches an extreme plan, which involves them posing as smugglers and taking hostages in an effort to get him and his best friend out of their hopeless environment before it is too late.

9:15pm: The Teacher

A Palestinian school teacher struggles to reconcile his commitment to political resistance with emotionally supporting one of his students. When a student is killed by an Israeli settler, the teacher's political life becomes intertwined with his role in the community. He reveals his past as well as stories of loss and heartache as he develops a romantic relationship with a volunteer NGO worker from the UK. Starring the inimitable Saleh Bakri, the film depicts a powerful story about how the Israeli occupation in the West Bank impacts the lives of individuals, specifically focusing on the threat of settler violence and the ongoing displacement and destruction of Palestinian land and homes.

10:00pm: Rage Karaoke

!!Rage Karaoke!! (Man Was Not Meant to Be Defeated Unless Destroyed) brings together a Swana metal band for a one-time-only punk political performance art experience. The band will play loud, the karaoke singers will take turns scream-reading lines from anti-Palestinian US legislation into the microphone. Together we will laugh, cry, purge our grief and anger and emerge from the sweaty gig a stronger, more determined resistance movement. Featuring Palestinian musicians Fritz Dorigo and Tarek Abdelqader. Conceived by Saeed Taji Farouky. Sponsored by Extreme Noise.

Tickets $5 in advance, sliding scale $5 - $15 at the door.

Venue: Bryant Lake Bowl, 810 West Lake St, Minneapolis, MN

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