In Hungary, and precisely in Hungary, an old man named "Egnac" lives as a homeless person in a sophisticated and complex society. This man tells about his childhood in a complex environment and continues to speak about himself intelligently, referring to homelessness, to the concept of God in his belief and the escalation of suicide in his country and, despite his difficult social situation and his sense of loneliness, Egnac remains a distinguished intellectual who lives and coexists in his city Budapest with an enlightened thought and dreams that one day he will fly in the sky like the mythical bird "Icarus".
This is a summary of the film that was admired by the jury of the Eighth National Forum for Cinema Al-Hamish in the city of Guercif, headed by director and critic Abdel-Ilah Al-Jawahry. Its director, Sanaa El-Alaoui, was awarded the Integrated Work Award for the session that the organizers intended to digitally hold under the slogan “Cinema in the Time of Stone between the Rites of Revelation and the Digital Invasion” over a period of three days from 26-27-28 December 2020 due to the pandemic conditions afflicting the country. The judging committee for the session was formed by director Abd El-Ilah Al-Jawahry as president, and the membership of each of the actress Manal Al-Siddiqi and the journalist Issa Wehbe.
The closing ceremony was broadcast live on the official pages of the Silver Screen Association on social media. During this period, the official competition prizes, which included ten films, were announced.
The competition prizes came as follows: The Integrated Work Award won by director Sanaa El-Alaoui for the film "icarus".
The screenplay prize goes to the film “The Philosopher” by Moroccan director Abdellatif Afdil.
The Best Female Diagnostic Actress Award was returned to actress Rania Al-Shani for her role in the short fictional film “Perfume”, where she was co-starred by the artist Saeed Bey and directed by Hussein Al-Shani.
The best actor award went to Rachid Ammari for his role in the movie “Blood and Charcoal”.
The award for best direction is returned to director Mostafa Armani for his film “The Last Wave”. The jury noted the experience of director Fatima Aklaz in her film "The Stick."
In addition to the films participating in the official competition, «Cococoku Lahcen Maanani - Baraka - Anas Hastak - Sharkh - Bilal Al Tawil - Parfum - Hussein Shani - The Lost Dream - Rashid Ammari - The Last Wave - Mustafa Farmati - The Philosopher - Fadel Abdel Latif - Blood and Charcoal - Tariq Rasmi - The Wand - Fatima Aklaz.
The course featured workshops in the script by director Allal Al-Alawi, and a workshop on artistic make-up by Azhar Al-Issawi. Ahmed Al-Sijjilmasi, a film critic and journalist interested in cinema history in Morocco, presented a window on documenting cinematic memory in Morocco.
Regarding the scientific symposium “Cinema in the Time of Stone between the Rituals of Watching and the Digital Invasion”, the success of the organizers was confirmed on two fronts: choosing the forum theme, considering its current and sensitivity, as well as the balanced elite of academic researchers and experts in the field.
Dr. Hisham El-Makki, the facilitator of the seminar's paragraphs, succeeded in stitching ideas together, weaving them, and compiling their abstracts in a way that can be understood and received by default. It receives the ideas and conclusions received from the director, scriptwriter and critic Professor Ezz Al-Arab Al-Alawi, critic and film researcher Dr. Al-Habib Al-Nassiri and Dr. Khaled Taha, and the researcher in media, communication and cultural studies Dr. Mustafa Lamerit within three axes that formed the basis of the symposium.
What are the dimensions and limits of the effects of these transformations on the physiological, mental, psychological, social and spiritual health of the spectator? What are the limits of the success of initiatives to bring the audience back to regular theaters through the "open-air cinema experience"? Can it be a future alternative?
The second axis: cinema and the digital conquest How overwhelming is the Internet for cinema? What are the limits of the success of online viewing services? What is the nature of the dramatic themes that creative people will present? What are the future limits of the divide between the real and the virtual in the film industry? Can digital platforms provide a film product that respects and maintains the peculiarities and nature of cinema? And to what extent will artificial intelligence, with algorithms for viewing platforms, contribute to the suggestion of films, the formation of aptitude, and their standardization in a society of fluid modernity values? The third axis: cinema and the time after Corona:
Based on this theoretical ground, this specialized symposium attempted to simplify this reality, diagnose and analyze, and open up possible horizons for thinking. Where the interveners agreed, from the angle of his competence, that what humanity is experiencing today is a global event that imposed a set of health measures, including physical distancing and home quarantine, in several countries as a precaution against infection with the virus. A crisis based on quarantine and restriction of movement, and the denial of some human rights with all their repercussions and impacts on the individual and the institution, especially with citizens leaving public spaces, preventing them from wandering and mixing in streets and alleys and accessing clubs, cabarets, cafes and public spaces, including cinemas and international and local film festivals that found themselves It is forced to suspend its offers and activities for an indefinite period in order to preserve the safety of its users.
And they recorded the reflections of this new reality with its multi-level effects in the cinematic industry, which made the film season exceptional by all standards in terms of canceling some international awards and festivals, amending the dates of most of them, and forcibly adapting the laws of some of them, and for the first time in the history of the screening of films broadcasted on different platforms were allowed to qualify To get the Oscars, without the need to display them in theaters. Individual watching rituals have also been affected by changing habits, by people resorting to alternatives to their usual practices during quarantine, and by the increase in home views of cinematic films through the sites and platforms available in many of them for free.
The symposium concluded that despite the darkness of this picture of the cinematic scene, there is a general tendency to adapt to this situation by temporarily dispensing with external photography, and taking precautions and health measures inside closed studios, and the increasing frequency of
Translated by Ali Karama from the Journal Ittihad Al Chtiraki writtten by Aziz Bakouche
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