Nestled in the heart of France, the Clermont-Ferrand International Short Film Festival (Clermont ISFF) has long been a beacon for storytellers from every corner of the globe.
This year, its focus, Maabar (meaning “Passage” in Arabic), celebrates Lebanese cinema, inviting audiences to step into the poignant, turbulent, and deeply human stories emerging from this small yet powerful cinematic hub.
Lebanon’s history, intertwined with war, displacement, and resilience, has often been captured through the lens of its filmmakers. These storytellers don’t just document struggles — they highlight the beauty, humour, and humanity that endure within their landscapes and communities. Every frame becomes a testament to the spirit of a nation that refuses to be defined by its hardships.
Even in the shadow of upheaval — including the 2019 thawra (uprising), the devastating 2020 Beirut port explosion, a crippling economic collapse, and the recent war with Israel — Lebanese cinema has not only endured but blossomed. It thrives on the raw, lived experiences of its creators, each one weaving personal and collective histories into films that speak to Lebanon’s rich, cosmopolitan identity.
Amid an economic crisis that has left 82 percent of the population below the poverty line, the resilience of Lebanese filmmakers is nothing short of awe-inspiring. They continue to find ways to share their stories, blending tradition with modernity and creating a cinematic landscape as diverse and layered as the country itself.
Lebanese filmmakers have found new ways to adapt and push boundaries, making the country a powerhouse in short films — a format that shines on limitless creativity and bold storytelling.
At Clermont ISFF, these films take the spotlight, diving deep into themes of identity, memory, and survival in ways that feel both personal and universal.
Shorts: fragments of Lebanon’s soul
The focus Maabar strikes a deep chord with Lebanon’s history, symbolising both a literal and figurative passage. Lebanon has long been a bridge between East and West, a meeting point of cultures, a country whose people have often been forced into exile in search of opportunity and hope. At the same time, the tiny country has been a sanctuary for displaced neighbours and a home to migrant workers.
In a time of uncertainty, a new generation of Lebanese filmmakers has decided to stay put and create, rather than leave in search of opportunities elsewhere. With limited resources but boundless creativity, they have embraced low-cost video techniques, shaping a bold and unconventional film scene that blends documentary with experimental storytelling.
Films like Dania Bdeir’s Warsha, which won a prize at Sundance, highlight the struggles of Syrian migrants in Lebanon. The film follows a construction worker who volunteers for a dangerous job operating a high-rise crane, where — far above the city — he finally finds the freedom to express his true self as a queer Muslim.
Similarly, Mai Masri’s Frontiers of Dreams and Fears captures the deep longing of two Palestinian girls who are separated by exile but stay connected through letters and dreams.
Les Chenilles, by sisters Michelle and Noel Keserwany, which won the Golden Bear for Best Short Film at Berlinale 2023, explores the connections between women shaped by displacement. Inspired by the harsh working conditions of 19th-century Levantine silk workers, the film follows two women in contemporary France who, despite their differences, share a history of struggle and migration.
The freedom of shorts
Lebanon’s strength in the short film format is undeniable, and the Clermont ISFF is the perfect setting to showcase the breadth and depth of this talent.
“Shorts are cheaper to produce, they can be made guerrilla-style, they can be much more experimental, it is easier to get co-productions on board, and they allow a bigger breadth of stories,” Abla Kandalaft, one of the moderators at Clermont ISFF, tells The New Arab.
She also notes that feature films require larger budgets and often come with constraints from foreign co-producers “whether French or German, and let’s be honest, they will have constraints on the stories you can tell”, Kandalaft says, adding that short films allow Lebanese filmmakers greater creative freedom.
“With shorts, as a Lebanese filmmaker, you’ll be able to tell the story you really want to tell, without having that money used as a constraint that curtails the story you want to tell,” Kandalaft says.
Part of the Maabar focus will be a programme dedicated to Wissam Charaf, a self-taught filmmaker whose work has repeatedly earned recognition at Clermont ISFF. His film, If the Sun Drowned Into an Ocean of Clouds, won the National Jury’s Special Prize last year. His work paints a portrait of Lebanon filled with poetry and laced with the absurdist, minimalist humour reminiscent of Kaurismäki.
“Wissam Charaf is a friend of the festival whose nearly every short he’s made has made it to the festival,” says Abla. “I will be talking to him about the scene in Lebanon, about why there are more shorts than feature films, and about what makes the shorts format so special.”
Another collection celebrates the groundbreaking work of Jocelyne Saab, a pioneering Lebanese filmmaker whose documentaries form a raw and intimate trilogy on Beirut’s wars. Born into a Christian bourgeois family, Saab became a fierce leftist activist, using her camera to document the devastation around her. Her films resurrect fragments of the past, piecing together memory as a tool for analysis and resilience.
Resistance through film
For many Lebanese filmmakers, cinema has always been an act of resistance — against forgetting, erasure, and the forces that seek to silence their stories.
This defiance is at the heart of films like Waves ’98 by Ely Dagher, which won the Palme d’Or at Cannes in 2015. Set in Beirut still reeling from the wounds of civil war, the film captures the city’s shifting moods — its hope and despair — through striking animation that blends hand-drawn visuals with still photography. Dagher’s film is both a personal reflection and a poetic tribute to a city that is both loved and resented.
Similarly, Maki & Zorro by Rami Kodeih brings an electrifying energy to the screen, following the collision of an Ethiopian domestic worker, a struggling actress, and a botched diamond heist in Beirut. The film’s fast-paced direction and gripping performances pull the audience into a world of high-stakes chaos, where survival is anything but certain.
In White Noise, co-directors Lucie La Chimia and Ahmad Ghossein craft a tense genre film about Said, a night security guard stationed beneath a bridge in Beirut. As the night unfolds, he encounters local gang leaders, a desperate vagabond, and an overwhelming sense that the city is swallowing him whole. With its sharp storytelling and gripping atmosphere, the film has left its mark on the festival circuit.
Finally, Letters, a collaborative project led by Josef Khallouf, offers a deeply personal cinematic response to Lebanon’s current reality. With the war in Gaza looming in the background, 18 Lebanese filmmakers craft a mosaic of personal reflections, weaving together letters that capture the uncertainty, grief, and endurance of life in 2024. Their stories turn personal pain into collective resistance, proving once again that Lebanese cinema is an act of remembering, reimagining, and refusing to be silenced.
The Clermont ISFF will run from 31 January to 8 FebruaryÂ
