Egyptian-Tunisian actress Hend Sabry will be the first Arab woman to sit on the judging panel at the Venice Film Festival, the world’s oldest film festival, when she judges the debut works section next month.
"I am proud to be one of the jury members of Venice Film Festival and I also feel proud that veteran directors Emir Kustrica and Antoinette Liowill be the jury presidents. I also am happy that this announcement coincides with the release of my movie 'El-Feel-el Azraa 2 (The Blue Elephant) which achieved huge success across the Arab world. I hope to be a good ambassador for Arab art at the oldest festival in the world, and one of the three most important festivals in the world," stated Sabry on her official Instagram account.
Sabry was born in 1979 in Kebli, Tunisia. She studied law and completed a master's degree in intellectual property and copyright law in 2004, but by then, she had already been acting for about a decade.
She started her acting career in 1994 with the Tunisian film Samt El Qosour (The Silence of the Palaces) and starred in The Season of Men in 2000. Both movies were directed by Moufida Tlatli.
She was then introduced to the Egyptian cinema by Inas El-Degheidy in 2001 with the film Mozakerat Morahka (The Diary of a Teenager), co-starring alongside Ahmed Ezz.
Sabry has worked on movies and dramas tackling numerous difficulties and stigma facing people, especially women in the Arab world, and she serves as the World Food Program's regional ambassador.
The star has received numerous awards during her cinema career, both for her artistic achievements and for her role in tackling key social issues, including an award from the America Abroad Media organisation in Washington. Sabri married in 2008 and has two daughters, Alia and Laila, who are six and four.
Armies of Sand
By Kenneth Pollack (Oxford University Press)
If you go...
Fly from Dubai or Abu Dhabi to Chiang Mai in Thailand, via Bangkok, before taking a five-hour bus ride across the Laos border to Huay Xai. The land border crossing at Huay Xai is a well-trodden route, meaning entry is swift, though travellers should be aware of visa requirements for both countries.
Flights from Dubai start at Dh4,000 return with Emirates, while Etihad flights from Abu Dhabi start at Dh2,000. Local buses can be booked in Chiang Mai from around Dh50
Some of Darwish's last words
"They see their tomorrows slipping out of their reach. And though it seems to them that everything outside this reality is heaven, yet they do not want to go to that heaven. They stay, because they are afflicted with hope." - Mahmoud Darwish, to attendees of the Palestine Festival of Literature, 2008
His life in brief: Born in a village near Galilee, he lived in exile for most of his life and started writing poetry after high school. He was arrested several times by Israel for what were deemed to be inciteful poems. Most of his work focused on the love and yearning for his homeland, and he was regarded the Palestinian poet of resistance. Over the course of his life, he published more than 30 poetry collections and books of prose, with his work translated into more than 20 languages. Many of his poems were set to music by Arab composers, most significantly Marcel Khalife. Darwish died on August 9, 2008 after undergoing heart surgery in the United States. He was later buried in Ramallah where a shrine was erected in his honour.
The team
Videographer: Jear Velasquez
Photography: Romeo Perez
Fashion director: Sarah Maisey
Make-up: Gulum Erzincan at Art Factory
Models: Meti and Clinton at MMG
Video assistant: Zanong Maget
Social media: Fatima Al Mahmoud
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The specs
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House-hunting
Top 10 locations for inquiries from US house hunters, according to Rightmove
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The years Ramadan fell in May
Sole survivors
- Cecelia Crocker was on board Northwest Airlines Flight 255 in 1987 when it crashed in Detroit, killing 154 people, including her parents and brother. The plane had hit a light pole on take off
- George Lamson Jr, from Minnesota, was on a Galaxy Airlines flight that crashed in Reno in 1985, killing 68 people. His entire seat was launched out of the plane
- Bahia Bakari, then 12, survived when a Yemenia Airways flight crashed near the Comoros in 2009, killing 152. She was found clinging to wreckage after floating in the ocean for 13 hours.
- Jim Polehinke was the co-pilot and sole survivor of a 2006 Comair flight that crashed in Lexington, Kentucky, killing 49.
