Can you see 168 movies in 7 days? You could try and enter the Guinness Book of World Records (and a hospital); or you could read this. Burning with the fever of cinema, we scoured through the very eclectic list of films playing at the 2009 Dubai International Film Festival (DIFF), and chose the finest and most delectable ten films for you. With so many countries and cinematic sensibilities represented at this year’s DIFF, yes, it was terribly complex and insane the process of whittling down the films t0 just 10 films — but at WearetheMovies.com we suffer so you don’t have to!

Broken Embraces (Los Abrazos Rotos)
Pedro Almodóvar | Spain | 2009
128 min

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2B-X7b1MQjk

A beguiling mix of melodrama, noir and pop culture nested within Spanish maverick Almodóvar’s trademark complex narrative style and eye-popping visuals. Broken Embraces is the fourth collaboration between Penélope Cruz and Pedro Almodóvar and it simply must not be missed.

City of Life
Ali F. Mostafa | United Arab Emirates | 2009
97 min

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D3m3I7iMnvw

What Crash was to Los Angeles, City of Life may be to Dubai. Whatever your personal feelings are towards Crash (okay, personally, we think it’s imbecilic and glib), that film’s influence on writer-director Ali F. Mostafa is clear: cultural melting pot theme and a dramatic exposition of multiple stories taking place within a single city (hey, we even noticed a car crash in the trailer — production value added, Crash-homage paid!). Every UAE resident should be curious to see City of Life, because it seems to be the first real stab at filmmaking by an Emirati.

Milk of Sorrow (La Teta Asustada)
Claudia Llosa | Spain/Peru | 2009
100 min

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4tcXEijN09o

A politically and emotionally gut-wrenching film that won the 2009 Golden Bear and FIPRESCI awards at the Berlinale. Concerns the abuse of women during the violent Maoist uprising in Peru during the 1980-1992 period. Title refers to the trauma of war passed onto children through breast milk by their mothers.

Mother (Madeo)
Joon-ho Bong | South Korea | 2009
129 min

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jYfv4jAi1ts

Joon-ho Bong’s Host is a favorite film here at WearetheMovies.com, and this year the auteur from South Korea returns with Mother, another genre-defying exploration of family and death, caked with Joon-ho’s trademark pitch-black humor.

Mother and Child
Rodrigo Garcia | USA/Spain | 2010
125 min

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KxI81XD9mA4

Garcia’s has a very rich and satisfying resume of independent films that includes Nine Lives and Ten Tiny Love Stories. (He dabbled in studio films with Passengers — an embarrassing bread-and-butter job.) With Mother and Child, Garcia returns to form with top-brass actors such as Naomi Watts and Samuel L. Jackson who took huge pay cuts to participate in his sensitive and intelligent portrayal of life in flux. Mother and Child is a Middle East Premiere at DIFF and also  a Gala Screening.

Nymph (Nang Mai)
Pen-Ek Ratanaruang | Thailand/Netherlands | 2009
94 min

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mONZEGl1EHU

The poster boy of the Thai’s New Wave cinema, Pen-Ek brings us another erotically-charged drama about a wife and a husband who travel to a jungle, both allegorical and physical. Reality and fantasy will collide at high speed. If you have seen Pen-Ek’s Last Life in the Universe, then you are ready for Nymph — else the experience may prove to be wild and giddy or crazy and strange. Excellent on both counts if you ask us!

A Prophet (Un Prophète)
Jacques Audiard | France | 2009
150 min

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vyOyUwwKgvc

Winner of the Grand Prix at the 2009 Cannes Film Festival and Best Film at the London Film Festival, A Prophet is a swan song to the gritty crime film genre and crafted by director Jacques Audiard to deliver “icons, images for people who don’t have images, the Arabs in France.” With such a pedigree, how can you possibly ignore it?

The Refuge (Le Refuge)
François Ozon | France | 2009
88 min

Often accused as the enfant terrible of contemporary French cinema, François Ozon is known for his frank depiction of human sexuality and wit. The Refuge is a story about an alienated young man and drugs and pregnancy. Being an Ozon film, expect the unexpected and prepare to laugh and wince.

Well Done, Abba
Shyam Benegal | India | 2009
135 min

Often described as the heir apparent to master filmmaker Satyajit Ray, Shyam Benegal is both prolific and daring for breaking the conventions of both mainstream and arthouse cinema in India. In recent years, Benegal has found success on both sides of the fence as Welcome to Sajjanpur proved. Well Done, Abba is another satirical tale of a driver caught up in the complexities of arranging his daughter’s wedding in a small Indian village.

Women Without Men (Zanan-e Bedun-e Mardan)
Shirin Neshat & Shoja Azari | Iran/Germany | 2010
95 min

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BjT2IeYSxY4

Co-directed by visual artist Shirin Neshat whose parents belonged to the upper-class generation of the Shah, Women Without Men takes place during the 1953 Iranian coup d’etat and tells the stories of four women who find solace in a magical orchard. Neshat lives in New York has been making films about Iran and women, exploring the tenuous socio-political facets of her heritage. This film won the Silver Loin at 2009 Venice Film Festival.

To buy your tickets, visit www.dubaifilmfest.com or call them at +9714-3913378

Celebrities at DIFF 2009

Hollywood:
Gerard Butler (receiving Variety’s International Star of the Year Award; but the most pertinent question is, will he DINE IN HELL?!?)
Matt Dillon (remember him?)
Mandy Moore (party prime rib)
Christopher Lambert (who? okay, we jest; we love this duke of B-cinema!)
…more ‘celebrities’ you’ll need to google to remember!

Indian Cinema:
Amitabh Bachchan (receiving Lifetime Achievement Award)
Other Bachchans (Jaya Bachchan, Abhishek Bachchan; yup, it’s a family affair)
Ranbir Kapoor (described by DIFF as “teenybopper sensation,” which is *not* a compliment)
Manisha Koirala (she’s judging the Muhr Arab and AsiaAfrica awards)
M.F. Hussain (he too is judging the Muhr Arab and AsiaAfrica awards)
Mammootty (the stalwart of cinema from Kerala)
…more of them will be seen around the city (shopping for clothes and gold, we’re sure)

Arab World:
Her Majesty Queen Noor of Jordan
Omar Sharif (receiving Lifetime Achievement Award)
Hala Sarhan
Somayya Al Kashab
Mostafa Fahmy
…and more, lost count, there are so many!

Panels & Workshops
Vive Le Cinema: co-producing fiction features with France
Against the Odds: a case study of filmmaking in Palestine
Variety-DIFF Spotlight: for filmmakers and producers in the Arab world
Screenwriting Workshop: in association with TorinoFilmLab
DIFF Young Journalist Award: in association with MBC and Funding in the Middle East

A staggering 168 movies from 55 countries will be playing over the week-long film festival (but then again, this is Dubai, so you only get more of more).  Only 2 days remain until the opening night of the 2009 Dubai International Film Festival. Excited?

Stay on top of things!
Follow our brutally honest, unhinged day-by-day reports and interviews with indie filmmakers on Twitter and Facebook. And remember — if you have reports of your own, we love email!

Dubai International Film Festival 2009

WearetheMovies.com has been diligently covering the festival since last year (our writers are pretty comprehensive and brutal; see links on the right), and this year we will once again jump into the fray, all guns blazing. Dubai is a city we love and we love it even more during the film festival. (Wait, I think I hear Bloomberg and Financial Times nerds crying foul, screaming “standstill” and “meltdown” — screw ‘em, what do philistines know about art.) The DIFF website has just unveiled the entire roster of films, schedule and price details. The information is a bit dense there, so here is a snapshot summary:

Films
The festival films have been split up into 16 programmes. You can navigate the selections by these categories, or become a film militant and scroll through each page, film by film (if you do this,  you will earn our greatest respect). I hand counted 168 films films in there, which is kinda insane and awesome. Ready? Now click these:
A Celebration of Indian Cinema (3 films)
Arab-French Rendez-Vous (5 films)
Arabian Nights (14 films)
Cinema for Children (7 films)
Cinema of Asia-Africa (11 films)
Cinema of the World (26 films)
Gulf Voices (10 films)
In Focus: France (6 films)
Lebanese Night (4 films)
Lifetime Achievement (4 films)
Muhr Arabic Documentary (14 films)
Muhr Arabic Feature (10 films)
Muhr Arabic Short (15 films)
Muhr AsiaAfrica Documentary (12 films)
Muhr AsiaAfrica Feature (15 films)
Muhr AsiaAfrica Short (12 films)

Ticket Prices
Regular tickets are AED 25 ($6.80), but if you’re a Student then it is only AED 10 ($2.70) which is nice of them. Tickets for the Red Carpet Gala Screenings, if you’re into that sort of thing, are AED 80 — only requirement is that they ask you wear “formal or national dress — no jeans.” Else they might kick you out, or worst… actually let you in where snobs in black ties and gowns will really make you feel at home. If you buy tickets in bulk (which we always recommend), then there are special discounted packages. Do the math yourself: let your brain and wallet pick the right deal here.

Box Office
They have counters at the Madinat Jumeriah, Mall of the Emirates and Dubai Media City. Check out this page for the operation hours and contact numbers. Hopefully, the young turks working the phones have a clue.

And you’re done.

(P.S. Need recommendations on what to see or avoid? We have something in the works. Meanwhile, read the early rants and raves from our feisty members on the WM Forum.)