Alexandria fest screens Turkish films

CAIRO - Anatolia News Agency

The Turkish movies “Do not forget me Istanbul” and “Serpentine” will be shown at Alexandria festival.

Two Turkish movies will be screened at the Alexandria Film Festival for Mediterranean Countries, which will take place Sept. 12-19.

The Turkish movies “Do not forget me Istanbul” and “Serpentine” will be shown at the festival. “These two Turkish films are very important works,” festival President Velid Seyfi said, speaking to Anatolia news agency.

A total of 16 movies will compete at the festival, representing Mediterranean countries including France, Algeria, Morocco, Croatia, Bosnia and Herzegovina and Serbia.

“Do not forget me Istanbul” has already received an award at the 18th International Rabat Movie Festival. The film is a joint effort by six directors, mainly from the Balkans and the Middle East – Bosnian Aida Begic, Serbian Stefan Arsenijevic, Greek Stergios Niziris, Eric Nazarian from the U.S., Palestinian Omar Shargawi and Dutch-Palestinian Hany Abu-Assad -- seeking to remind audiences that Istanbul is a city whose memory goes beyond Turkey’s borders and whose history belongs to the people of those countries as well. The filmmakers hope the movie will also vie for prestigious awards at the Cannes and Berlin film festivals.

The festival aims to disseminate film culture from the Mediterranean across the different branches of the movie industry and to strengthen relationships between filmmakers around the world as well as between the Mediterranean countries.