Coming to a big screen near you is the new movie by Lebanese film-making duo Joana & Khalil Joreige, "A Perfect Day". I am not going to repeat the synopsis of the film because it's everywhere on the web, and here and here too... Basically, the movie has been travelling around festivals worldwide, has won the FIPRESCI prize at the Locarno Film Festival, and Ziad Saad (Malek) was awarded the Best Actor Award at the Namur Film Festival in Belgium, making it the first time an Arab has ever earned such a merit!
The reason why I am dwelling on this cinematic event is because Ziad is a very close friend of mine, and having attended required Drama classes at college together, I can attest to the fact that he has always been a reluctant pupil, and not a very succesful one for that matter. While I shone in class, really, he sucked... Never had he had any professional acting experience before, and I am proud to have been the first to cast him in one of my university short-movie back in the days when I still believed I could win an Oscar for Best Director. Actually, if I recall correctly, only his arm appeared in my movie, but nonetheless, I believe I do have some credit in his fine breakthrough performance in A Perfect Day.
So the award came as quite a shock for the both of us, and not being jealous in the least of my friend's award (which he was not able to personally collect for absence of a visa), I am proud to be the one to urge everyone to support this movie by your paying presence in festivals everywhere! I will be (finally) viewing it at the London Film Festival next week, and, armed with a cardboard cutout of an Oscar statuette, I will be delivering my speech of acceptance at the end of the movie on the sidewalk somewhere near the ICA exit doors.
Be there in numbers!!!! Thank you, thank you so much!
6 comments:
hahaha... wlek remember that it is HIM acts in teh movie and who won, not YOU!!!!
it's killing me not to be in london that day. maybe i can see it in beirut!!!
yiiiiiii...thats Ziad.,,haha its so funny, Cant wait to see it! I so wish he was with us so that for once we will be arriving to a movie with no other but THE STAR of the movie...
I am so happy for you! It seems you actually now someone who has made an incredible achievement. Just think of it, you where in his class! Will there be a credit for you at the end of the film? "person known to main actor who has done all the work himself" or perhaps it should be "classmate arrogant enough to think his talent her influence" Congratulations, well done!
Hello Anonymous,
It's sad that you take yourself and others so seriously, and do not see the self-irony behind the post. Ziad has been my closest friend for years, and you cannot even begin to imagine how proud I am of him.
The irony (if I must be so obviously explanatory) is that being an actor was never in his plans, while he had always mocked my teenage fantasies of delivering an Oscar speech.
The point is that we both were shocked and marvelled by the news when he was announced the award, and he made great point of poking yet again at the irony of the role reversal....
There you go, do you get it now?
Yeah me too... I just love myself so much
Back again, are you? I'm guessing you're Anonymous who congratulated me for my lovely influence on Ziad... What made you pop round to this post again? Still shocked five months on?
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