Maher Essam

Eleven directors from eleven countries each contribute an eleven-minute short reflecting on the events of 11 September 2001: A village teacher in Iran tries to explain to her young students what's happened; city kids in Burkina Faso think they've spotted Osama bin Laden; a deaf Frenchwoman in Manhattan writes a Dear John letter to a man who left that morning for work at the World Trade Center; a Chilean remembers Allende; events recall other deaths; a mother endures more than her son's death. Tones vary, as do the locales. Most concern coming to terms with the events of the day, but at least one confronts the viewer with tragedy and death.

10 filmmakers provide 10 separate stories focusing on the 18 days of the 2011 Egyptian revolution. Ten stories they have experienced, heard, or imagined.

Yousry Nasrallah's powerful adaptation of Lebanese writer Elias Khoury's epic novel of fifty years of Palestinian dispossession, exile, and resistance. The film follows the flight of Younes, his wife Nahila, and those around them, from their village in northern Palestine to a refugee camp in Lebanon. Some vow to continue the struggle, most simply struggle to survive. Unsparingly detailing the impact of the nakba (disaster) on Palestinian life and society and the refugees' often-contentious relationship with their reluctant Lebanese hosts, Gate of the Sun spans generations, mixing personal stories with historical events.

Officer Wahid is assigned to work undercover to enter the ring of the largest drug trafficker, he uses the help of the repentant night girl Naima, to impersonate the long-disappeared daughter of the drug leader, who welcomes them into his home before his sister discovers the truth.

Kidnapped as a child and raised in the circus, a young lion tamer's tough side emerges when he gets entangled in an underworld murder mystery.

During the Gulf War, Fatma works as a maid for a wealthy man, and her son Mohammed is suffering from oppression by his teacher Mansour, who's having an affair with Fatima, taking advantage of her difficult circumstances. Mohammad gets drawn to extremist religious world led by Sheikh Khalid.

Qarmouti builds a graveyard for his ancestors, and makes it a paid tourists attraction; this causes him lots of problems with the government. Meantime, a journalist videos an antiquities smuggling operation and the tape ends up with Qarmouti who finds himself chased by the smugglers.

Egypt, 1947: in the midst of a cholera outbreak. A washerwoman tries to take care of her family, while at the same time resisting the advances of a charming suitor who's half her age.