In Tripoli, Lebanon, an unfinished dome designed by architect Niemeyer becomes a strange chamber for musical echoes.

In 1975, war interrupted the construction of a dome designed by Oscar Niemeyer in Tripoli. The unfinished concrete structure was left behind with an exceptional acoustic. For five days, Firas El Hallak invited musicians to experiment with this unique space. Their performances form a musical film in which the history of Tripoli and the traces of a modernist project shattered by violence resonate.

With CINEMAMED & BAFF – Beirut Art Film Festival

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In a high-security prison in Tuscany, inmates create a baroque and flamboyant theatre.

Since 1988, men serving long sentences in Volterra have rehearsed, read and performed under the direction of Armando Punzo. Born in prison, the Compagnia della Fortezza has become one of Italy’s most singular theatre companies, earning a Golden Lion at the Venice Biennale. Elsa Amiel takes us into their rehearsal room, onto the stage and on tour, staying close to the collective work of bodies, voices and imagination. Texts are read, repeated and reworked until images emerge. From words, a powerful theatre takes shape, where tragedy surfaces and blood and sweat mingle with light.

WITH THE FILMMAKERS

Between transmission and resistance, Germaine Acogny continues to set bodies in motion while defending the place where she has chosen to pass on her art.

Born in Benin in 1944 and raised in Senegal, Germaine Acogny has spent fifty years shaping African contemporary dance and transforming representations of the Black body on international stages. The film traces her journey from her encounters with Senghor and Béjart to the École des Sables, which she founded in Toubab Dialaw and where she continues to pass on her art to dancers from around the world. Today, the school faces a new threat: the lagoon opposite from it is being torn up for the construction of a vast container port. At over 80, Germaine Acogny is still ready to fight.

A dive into the archive of filmmaker Chris Marker, in search of the man behind the images.

Guidée par la voix de Charlotte Rampling, une archiviste se plonge dans les 550 cartons laissés par le cinéaste Chris Marker. Photographies, écrits, documents personnels, fragments de films : elle rassemble ces traces pour tenter de reconstituer le portrait d’un cinéaste qui a toujours cultivé le mystère autour de sa vie et de son identité.
Mais les archives ne livrent jamais une histoire toute faite. Les extraits de La Jetée, Sans Soleil et d’autres films de Marker sont repris, remontés et confrontés à ses documents personnels. Peu à peu, les fragments se répondent, les souvenirs se déplacent et le portrait se transforme.
Brecht Debackere fait de cette enquête une plongée dans l’univers de Marker, où les archives deviennent un espace de mémoire en mouvement et les films, des machines à remonter le temps.

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In Tripoli, the cinemas have disappeared. The memories remain very much alive.

Between the 1930s and the end of the 20th century, Tripoli was home to more than thirty cinemas. The « cilama » were more than places to watch films: they were places to meet, learn, debate, hide and resist. Decades later, filmmaker Hady Zaccak searches for what remains. Drawing on hundreds of images and around forty testimonies, he brings together cinematic memories, archives, personal stories and wartime experiences in a love letter to Tripoli and cinema.

With CINEMAMED & BAFF – Beirut Art Film Festival

With Barbara Forever, director Brydie O’Connor takes on the ambitious task of telling the story of pioneering lesbian filmmaker Barbara Hammer.

In the early 1970s, at 27, Hammer began filming her own life. Her body, lovers, desires, anger and joy became the raw material of her cinema. At a time when lesbian stories remained largely invisible, she created a radiant body of work where the intimate became a space for experimentation and self-affirmation. Drawing on decades of films, archives and recordings, Barbara Forever lets Hammer tell her own story. Her voice guides the images she created, while her longtime partner Florrie Burke reflects on their life together and the enduring legacy of her work.

Warning: full nudity and explicit sexual content.

Session presented in French by ladestructiondesespacesvides.