NAAS is a network that champions innovation in cinema exhibition in the Arabic-speaking region. Through its work, NAAS aims to broaden the scope of films available to the Arab public and encourage dialogue around cinema and its history with the hopes of tapping into the potential presented by the collective experience of watching film in a public setting. We support initiatives that attempt through their programming, events, space, outreach, and operation to support a vibrant and sustainable cinema culture with the aim of developing audiences engaging with film.
Happening across the Network
Screening of Sharp Tools by Nujoom Al Ghanem + Q&A discussion session at Cinema Akil
Samawa Cinema hosts a seminar titled Biography and Its Effects in Akira Kurosawa Films.
Jesuit Animation School - the first public screening of "Made In Egypt"
NAAS member Samawa Cinema launches a training program in collaboration with the IFW (Association for Skilled Iraqi Women). The program includes workshops and conversations around cinema, targeted at women coming from regions affected by the war in Iraq
The Samawa Cinema Club opens in December a new screen space in Baghdad, as part of its work with the organization of Burj Babel.
Filmlab: Palestine (FLP) announces developments and updates for the upcoming fifth edition of Palestine Cinema Days. Previously titled Days of Cinema, the festival continues in 2018 under a new name.
Cinémathèque Beirut
Arabiyat at Cinémathèque de Tanger, Tangier
Cairo Cinema Days at Zawya Cinema, Cairo
Eviction of Al Balad Theater in Amman
From Egypt With Love: 4 recent Egyptian feature films at Metropolis Empire Sofil, Beyrouth
The Forum Expanded program of the Berlinale featured the panel, Of Dust and Rubies – A Film on Suspension, about the work of the late Sudanese filmmaker Hussein Shariffe, with two NAAS members Talal
In 2018, the Prize for film circulation was awarded by a jury composed of NAAS members to the film The Day I Ate The Fish by Aida El Kashef, presented as a project in post-production during the “Ate
The closure of cinemas in the African continent in the recent past has been widely perceived as the end of an era; a closer look, however, reveals otherwise.
