Colourful closing ceremony of DIFF telecast live exclusively on Abu Dhabi Emarat Channel Highlights of the finale of DIFF 2010 include the Festival’s honouring of its 2010 Lifetime Achievement Honourees; and the presentation of the 2010 Muhr Arab, Muhr Asia Africa and Muhr Emirati Awards. The live telecast also covered the red carpet ceremony attended by international celebrities and stars from the Arab world and the UAE. ...

Red carpet gala of ‘The Way Back’ (Dec. 15) at the Dubai International Film Festival Celebrities who attended were Colin Farrell (In Bruges, Phone Booth, Minority Report) Ed Harris (Apollo 13, A Beautiful Mind, Appaloosa), Jim Sturgess (Heartless, 21, The Other Boleyn Girl), Saoirse Ronan (Atonement, City of Ember, The Lovely Bones), Mark Strong, Dragoş Bucur, and Gustaf Skarsgård. The film is an Exclusive Media Group, National Geographic Entertainment and Imagenation...

Industry buyers at DIFF will have one of the strongest repertoires of films to choose from including 103 films screened at DIFF, 43 films from the Gulf Film Festival, and 78 Filmmart-recommended films. The line-up includes 23 world premieres, 6 international Premieres, 37 Middle East premieres, and 21 GCC premieres. Ziad Yaghi, Director, Dubai Filmmart, said the trading and distribution platform has grown considerably over the past years by successfully accomplishing distribution deals fo...

The award introduced in 2009, is aimed at encouraging and promoting films that address human rights issues. At DIFF 2010, 10 films will vie for the honours. Judging the submissions for the HRFN award is Kebour Genna of the Addis International Film Festival; Taco Ruighaver, Director, the Movies that Matter Festival in Amsterdam, Netherlands; and Syrian filmmaker Sawsan Darwaza, whose films depict the harsh realities of life in strife-torn areas of the Middle East yet with a powerful messag...

Screening on Wednesday, Dec. 15 at 10 pm at Cinestar 9, Mall of the Emirates (MoE), is director Shuchen Tan’s ‘Baghdad Film School.’ The film is about Iraqi born filmmakers Maysoon Pachachi and Kasim Abid who developed the challenging idea to open up the first independent film school in Iraq. With a car loaded with video equipment, they undertook their dangerous journey from Amman to Baghdad and in March 2004 they opened up the doors of their school. Their mission was to give a voice to ...

The Dubai International Film Festival today named American film icon and international social and political activist Sean Penn as its Western honouree for 2010. Penn, whose career spans nearly three decades, more than 45 films and notable successes as producer, director, actor and screenwriter, will accept the DIFF Lifetime Achievement Award at the Festival’s opening ceremony on December 12, 2010. Announcing the award at the curtain-raiser press conference for DIFF 2010, Festival Chairman Abdu...

Tron: Legacy, a 3D high-tech adventure set in a digital universe and boasting some of the most spectacular visuals in recent cinema, will be the closing gala film of the Dubai International Film Festival 2010. Disney’s long-awaited, stand-alone follow-up to its 1982 classic Tron will screen at DIFF on December 18, 2010, a day after its release in the United States and Canada. Tron: Legacy continues DIFF’s practice of integrating major 3D films into the Festival and its tradition of closing w...