ALL FILMS # A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z

TALKING ABOUT TREES Cinema's Legacy

Description

Ibrahim, Suliman, Manar and Eltayeb — filmmakers and friends for more than 45 years —meet regularly in the capital of Khartoum as the Sudanese Film Group. Their mission is to screen films for the public, which, after decades of war and division, has grown up without access to the cinema, and to resurrect a long neglected outdoor cinema. Meanwhile, with no money and plenty of time on their hands, the irrepressible filmmakers block out scenes from a new script and, hilariously, dress up to re-create the final scene from SUNSET BOULEVARD.

A crash course in the history of Sudanese cinema and a delightful ode to lifelong friendships, Suhaib Gasmelbari’s beautiful film won both the Documentary Jury Award and Panorama Documentary Audience Award at the 2019 Berlin Film Festival. –Ken Jacobson

Bios

Born in Sudan in 1979, Suhaib Gasmelbari lived there until the age of 16. He studied film at the Université Paris 8 in France and worked as a freelance cameraman and editor for Al Qarra, Al Jazeera and France 24. He has written and directed many short fiction films and documentaries. During his research into Sudanese audio-visual archives for TALKING ABOUT TREES, he found some films believed to have been lost and actively participated in national and international projects to save and digitize them. TALKING ABOUT TREES is his feature debut.