Egyptian-Lebanese Film 'Arzé' Selected for Tribeca Film Festival

Egyptian-Lebanese feature film ‘Arzé’ has been selected for screening at New York’s Tribeca Film Festival on June 11th, marking the film’s North American premiere in competition. Directed by Lebanese filmmaker Mira Shaib, the film has been entered into the ‘Viewpoints’ category, which aims to discover the ‘most boundary-pushing, rule-breaking’ directors in independent film. This year’s edition of the festival marks the first time that Viewpoints selections will be presented in competition.

Starring Abou Abboud, Betty Taoutel, Bilal Al Hamwi, and Katy Younes, the story of Arzé follows its titular character Arzé, a single mother who takes her teenage son on an odyssey across Beirut to retrieve their stolen scooter, their only source of livelihood.

“We wanted to tell a story about our mothers, and all Lebanese women, who have held the country together despite everything,” writers Sam Faisal Shaib and Louay Khraish tell CairoScene.

Whilst the film’s director and writers are Lebanese, production was handled by Egyptian Ali El Arabi, founder of Ambient Light Films, an international production company based in Cairo and Los Angeles.

El Arabi gained acclaim as co-producer of Sudan’s second-ever Academy Awards submission for Best International Film, ‘Goodbye Julia’, directed by Mohamed Kordofani. The film, which tells the intersecting story of two families against the backdrop of civil unrest in Sudan, won the inaugural Prix de Liberté at Cannes in 2023.