What is Short Talk ?
Carthage Talks creates a space dedicated to the short film genre, which echoes the vision of the artistic team and the efforts undertaken over the years to bring visibility to this genre and its content creators. Short Talk is designed as a space for discussion bringing together an array of short films creators, programmers and distributors, with a focus on African and Arab cinematographies. Short Talk will be accompanied by the launch of a new program, the JCC Short Lab, lead by Yamina Mechri Bendana, head of the festival’s short films, who explains its spirit:
The JCC Shorts Lab project : an idea in motion
The idea of setting up a structure for the benefit of the Arab and African short film began to emerge in 2017, when Nejib Ayed asked me to be on the selection committee for the Carthage Film Festival. In charge of the short film section, I took a close interest in the specificities of the genre. During these three years, I was able to observe different forms of its evolution, from the production conditions to the distribution.
In Tunisia, as in the Arab world and on the African continent, the short film is relegated to a secondary place. It is considered an exercise clearing the ground for filmmakers and allowing them to switch to feature films, the only way for the « big leagues ». The discrimination against the short film is clear. The stages of manufacture are ungrateful and life cycles, brief, do not allow to impose this category as a complete and independent genre.
Launching the JCC Shorts Lab is the result of a statement of maturity and a need. It is about engaging in a festival of the scale of Carthage Film Festival, a vital battle in favor of the film and the film sector.
For the « Nejib Ayed session », and in the continuity of its intuitions, we gather in 2019 experiences from all horizons working around the short film to feed the discussions around the possibilities of building viable projects from the Arab and African contexts, in order to encourage and consolidate this particular form of expression.
Yamina Mechri Bendana
Friday, November the 1st, 2019
Cité de la Culture - Sophie El Golli Hall - 1st Floor
10:30 - 12:30
A platform for reflection on short films can not be set without the participation of screenwriters, directors, producers, distributors, not to mention the programmers. We propose to gather these skills around a round table on perspectives and horizons of the Arab and African short film within the JCC, in the hope of designing a structure that would serve to develop this cinematographic genre.
A conversation with:
Azza Chaabouni (Head of the “خطوات Ciné Par’Court” programme)
Charlotte Corchète (Head of the Pardi di domani committee, Locarno Film Festival)
Ana David (Short Film Programmer, at IndieLisboa)
Darine Hotait (Founder of Cinephilia Short Lab)
Yamina Mechri Bendana (Head of Short Film, JCC-Carthage Film Festival)
