In recent years the Sofia MENAR Film Festival became firmly established as the biggest festival in Bulgaria for Middle East and North Africa cinema productions, including feature films, documentaries and short projects. The term MENAR, for “Middle East and North Africa Region”, is an acronym often used to cover an extensive area, stretching from Morocco to Iran, including the majority of both the Middle Eastern and Maghreb countries. The term has also a second meaning: Menár /منار , pronounced also manár/ in Arabic language means lighthouse, light tower, guiding light. So it is the aim of the festival to not only present the movies but also to create an exemplary connection between people.

From April 7th to 16th a selection of the movies will be presented in Ruse for the first time.

April 7th, 7 pm.
Le Sac de Farine (The Bag of Flour)
(Belgium-Morocco, 2012, 89 min., Director: Kadija Leclere)
Based on the true life of the director, the film traces the story of an eight year-old Moroccan Muslim girl who is living in a Catholic orphanage in Belgium in 1970s. She is taken by her biological father to a poverty-stricken village in the Atlas Mountains of Morocco, where she spends her teen ages simultaneous with the years of Hunger Revolt in Morocco and has to find a way to earn her board.

April 8th, 7 pm.
Almanya – Willkommen in Deutschland (Almanya – Welcome to Germany)
(Germany, 2011, 101 min., Director: Yasemin Samdereli)
Almanya documents the story of a Turkish family, headed by a grandpa. Each member of the large family seems to hold a different opinion about his or her Turkish-German upbringing and personal degree of assimilation — so when grandpa declares over dinner that he has purchased a home in Turkey and would like to take a family trip for everyone to see it, he is met with much resistance.

April 9th, 7 pm.
Türkiye’de Caz (Jazz in Turkey)
(Turkey, 2013, Director: Batu Akyol)
The documentary can be summarized as a project, which explores the condition, evolution and interaction of Turkish jazz music and its musicians, in parallel to Turkish history.

April 14th, 7 pm.
Lal gece (Night of Silence)
(Turkey, 2012, 92 min., Director: Reis Çelik)
In a remote Turkish village, an ancient blood feud between two families has finally been put to rest, and a marriage arranged to seal the union; a man just released from a life in prison has been pledged to a teenage girl he has never met. Fearful of the consummation of rituals, which are custom in the wedding night, the bride distracts her broken husband with tales, rounding out the hours as dawn draws nearer.

April 15th, 7 pm.
Trabantem napric Afrikou (Trabant Goes to Africa)
(Czech Republic, 2011, 96 min., Directors: Dan Priban, Dana Zlatohlavkova)
Traveling 20,000 km in the world’s cheapest car across the poorest continent, this doc is all about big dreams and a healthy disregard for the impossible. Without backup vehicles and no guarantee of a happy ending, 2 Trabants, armed with 2 strokes and 2 cylinders each, take an irreverent and mishap-filled journey, all the way from Libya to the Cape of Good Hope.

April 16th, 7 pm.
Bekas
(Sweden-Finland-Iraq, 2012, 97 min., Director: Karzan Kader)
This is a story about two homeless brothers (Zana, 7) and (Dana, 10) who live on the edge of survival. After they caught a glimpse of Superman through a hole in the wall at the local cinema, Zana and Dana decide that they want to go to America and live with Superman. This is the starting point for an incredible journey.

In cooperation with Pozor Company.