Cinema and the Arab World
On these pages you will find a range of services of free-lance author, curator and scholar Irit Neidhardt in the field of Cinema and the Arab World. For requests, please contact me at the address below.
I deal with questions of production, presentation and reception of films with regards to aspects of Arab societies and politics, the European gaze on its neighboring region in the southern and eastern Mediterranean as well as facets of European-Arab cooperation, including historical periods of Arab filmmaking in Germany.
This includes subjects as the cooperation of both German States with the Palestinian Liberation Organization PLO in the 1970s and 1980s; the genre of the music video which is very popular in the Arab World; the critical-analytical examination of European funding of Arab movies; Arab women films from the years before the uprisings that started in Tunisia in 2010 or the question about the origin of the images we see from and about the war in Syria.
Since 2012 I have been compiling the Funding Guide for Arab Filmmakers and Producers on behalf of Aflamuna (formerly Beirut DC) which is by now accessible online.
To get a more precise idea about my services with regard to
- curating of film programs
- lectures and film talks
- workshops and tutorials
- panel discussions
- moderations
- publications
you are invited to browse around this homepage. In each section you will find examples and references to previous activities.
Learn about mec film, the distribution and sales company for films by Arab directors which I run or find information about me.
Lecture
Gaza in Context: Politics, Economics, Images
April 26, 2026 at 12:30 pm, Café Palestine, Cologne
The city of Gaza, where Asia, Africa, and Europe meet, is at least 4.000 years old. Located at the end of the Incense Route, one of the oldest known trade routes in the world, it was a prosperous, cosmopolitan port city on the Mediterranean until the 20th century. Continue at Café Palestine Colonia (event in German)
Walking Tour
Babylon Berlin. Atlas of Arab Film in Early 20th Century Berlin
28 April 2026 at 17:00 until ca. 19:00, Meeting point Hegelplatz (near Bhf Friedrichstr.)
In the program of ALFILM, Arab Film Festival Berlin
At the intersection of Unter den Linden and Friedrichstraße, as well as in the Filmstadt district on the southern end of Friedrichstraße, numerous Arab-German encounters in the film industry took place between the 1910s and 1930s. The walking tour continue at ALFILM (event in German)
Text
Palestinian Students at the State Film School of the GDR. A Fragment
Online at the website of the Film University Babelsberg KONRAD WOLF, the former State Film School of the GDR. In German
Previous entries were moved to the News Archive.