A World Not Ours: Screening and Discussion

Proof of registration, via a QR code on your phone or on paper, will be required to enter Reid Hall. Entry will be refused to those who are not registered.

Please note that access will not be permitted 15 minutes after the start of the event.

This event will be held in English.

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Filmmaker and Fellow Mahdi Fleifel presents his documentary film, A World Not Ours (2012), which has won numerous prizes, including the Peace Film Prize at the Berlin International Film Festival, the Black Pearl Award for Best Documentary in Abu Dhabi, and the Viktor Dok Horizon Award in Munich. The screening will be followed by a discussion with the filmmaker.

A World Not Ours is an intimate, humorous, portrait of three generations of exile in the refugee camp of Ein el-Helweh, in southern Lebanon. Based on a wealth of personal recordings, family archives, and historical footage, the film is a sensitive, and illuminating study of belonging, friendship, and family. Filmed over more than 20 years by multiple generations of the same family, A World Not Ours is more than just a family portrait; it is an attempt to record what is being forgotten, and mark what should not be erased from collective memory.

Mahdi Fleifel, currently a Fellow at the Columbia Institute for Ideas and Imagination, is an award-winning filmmaker whose work explores themes of displacement, identity, and memory through both fiction and documentary. A graduate of the UK’s National Film & Television School, he founded Nakba FilmWorks in 2010 and works between Denmark, England, and Greece. His acclaimed films—including A World Not Ours, A Man Returned, and A Drowning Man—have received major honors at Berlinale, Cannes, and IDFA. His latest feature, To a Land Unknown, premiered at Cannes 2024 and is set for theatrical release in over 40 countries.

This event will take place in Reid Hall’s Grande Salle Ginsberg-LeClerc, built in 1912 and extensively renovated in 2023 thanks to the generous support of Judith Ginsberg and Paul LeClerc.