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• For the first time, direct live-feed of Cannes Film Festival opening ceremony and red carpet to be brought to Doha at special celebratory event and screening series
• Doha Film Institute to screen four Cannes favorites: Omar, Winter Sleep, The Search, and Inside Llewyn Davis at the Katara Drama Theatre
• Palestinian actor and star of Omar, Adam Bakri, will be in attendance for a special question-and-answer session following a screening of the film, which won the prestigious Un Certain Regard Jury Prize in 2013

Doha, Qatar; May 5, 2015: The Doha Film Institute is bringing all the excitement of the Cannes Film Festival including a live-feed telecast of the opening ceremony and red carpet on May 13. The screening series from May 13 – 15 will present a selection of favourite films from past editions of the world’s most prestigious film festival along with a, photo gallery and exciting giveaways.

The films to be showcased at the ‘Festival de Cannes Special’ at Katara Cultural Village include:
2013 Un Certain Regard Jury Prize winner Omar by two-time Academy Award nominee Hany Abu-Assad; 2014 Palm d’Or winner Winter Sleep by Turkish auteur Nuri Bilge Ceylan; The Search, directed by Michel Hazanavicius (The Artist), which screened at Cannes 2014 and features a searing performance by Academy Award-nominated actress Bérénice Bejo; and 2013 Grand Prix winner Inside Llewyn Davis by 2015 Cannes Jury Presidents, the Coen Brothers, Joel & Ethan. Palestinian actor, Adam Bakri, will be in attendance for a special question-and-answer session following the screening of Omar.

The opening ceremony of the Cannes Film Festival on May 13 will be broadcast live into the Katara Drama Theatre and will feature the eminent members of the jury including Joel & Ethan Coen, Rossy De Palma, Sophie Marceau, Sienna Miller, Rokia Traoré, Guillermo Del Toro, Xavier Dolan and Jake Gyllenhaal. The world’s leading film talents are also expected to walk the red carpet alongside representatives from the opening film La Tête Haute by Emmanuelle Bercot starring French film legend Catherine Deneuve, Benoit Magimel, Sara Forestier and Rod Paradot. The live telecast will commence at 8pm ahead of the screening of Omar.

Omar (Palestine, 2014; Arabic & Hebrew with Arabic & English subtitles), directed by Hany Abu-Assad, will screen on Wednesday May 13th at 8PM preceded by the live-feed of the opening ceremony. Nominated for the Best Foreign Language film at the Academy Awards, the film is about the eponymous hero, who is accustomed to dodging surveillance bullets to cross the separation wall to visit his secret love Nadia. But occupied Palestine knows neither simple love nor clear-cut war. On the other side of the wall, the sensitive young baker Omar becomes a freedom fighter who must face painful choices about life and manhood.

Palm d’Or winner Winter Sleep (Turkey, 2014; Turkish with Arabic & English subtitles) by Nuri Bilge Ceylan is an immersive, provocative Chekhovian drama and a hypnotic study of human frailty. Set in the picturesque and striking landscape of Cappadocia in Central Anatolia, it focuses on a small village, half-empty, in the wintry off-season. The film follows a local celebrity, Aydin (Haluk Bilginer), who runs a small hotel with his young wife, with whom he has a stormy relationship, and his sister who is suffering from her recent divorce. In winter as the snow begins to fall, the hotel turns into a shelter but also an inescapable place that fuels animosity. The film will be screened on Thursday May 14th at 7PM.

Directed by Michel Hazanavicius, The Search (France, Georgia, 2014, Chechen, English, French & Russian with Arabic & English subtitles) is set in 1999 against the backdrop of the Second Chechen War. It recounts a powerful story of conflict through four lives that are brought together by a shocking twist of fate. A nurse forms a bond with a Chechen boy, while his sister searches for him and a young Russian soldier faces the torment of wartime. The free screening of The Search will be on Friday May 15th at 4pm.

Directed by Joel & Ethan Coen, Inside Llewyn Davis (USA, 2013; English with Arabic subtitles) follows a week in the life of a young folk singer as he navigates the Greenwich Village folk scene of 1961. Guitar in tow, huddled against the unforgiving New York winter, Llewyn Davis (Oscar Isaac) is struggling to make it as a musician against seemingly insurmountable obstacles. Brimming with music performed by Isaac, Justin Timberlake and Carey Mulligan as well as Marcus Mumford and Punch Brothers, the film is an epic on an intimate scale. It represents the Coen Brothers’ fourth collaboration with multiple-Grammy and Academy Award-winning music producer T Bone Burnett. The film will be screened on Friday May 15th at 7:30 PM.

Apart from The Search, which is a free screening, regular tickets are priced QAR35; student tickets are QAR25 on presenting a valid student ID. Tickets can be purchased online at www.dohafilminstitute.com‫ ‬ or in person from Box Offices at Building 16, Drama Theatre.