Cairo International Film Festival has announced opening submissions in all categories for creators who are wishing to participate in activities of its 45th edition, which will be held from 15 to 24 November at the Egyptian Opera House. The submission process shall officially be open to requests from all over the world starting from April 15 2023, until August 1 2023. Via the official website of festival.

In this occasion, Mr. Hussein Fahmy, President of festival, stated, “We are happy with all the great feedbacks we have received about the last edition from both the press and festival’s audience, and we are proud of all achievements of forty-fourth edition at the level of programming and inviting important industry guests. We also consider receiving Great industry stars such as Bella Tarr, Naomi Kawase, and Matthew Kassowitz, and the special program for the late French director Jean-Luc Godard, as an indication of the global position of CFF worldwide, and the place it occupies with its ancient history in Cinema industry. We promise festival audience an edition no less than the previous one in terms of the quality and level of films and the rather important participating guests.

Director Amir Ramses, director of festival, added, “Choosing the program for forty-fourth edition’s films was a great adventure, and full of ambition that made this edition worthy of the name and history of Cairo Film Festival. We were so pleased sharing this diverse group of distinguished films with festival’s audience, and this year we promise several similar surprises at the level of various film competitions and special festival programmes.

We also added this year a competition for documentary films as part of festival’s development plan and its absorption of various currents and cinematic styles, not to mention celebrating rather valuable genre in the industry.”

The activities of the last edition witnessed participation of a large group of the most significant films that were shown in the most influential international festivals And it received critical acclaim and won many noteworthy awards.

The last edition witnessed screening of 108 films from 53 countries, including 30 films in their global and international premieres, and 57 films in their premieres in the Middle East and North Africa. Among these films was “Alcarràs”, winner of the (Golden Bear Award) at the “Berlin Film Festival”, “Bread and Salt”, which won the (Jury Prize) for Horizons Competition at the “Venice Film Festival”, as well as “EO”, which won the (jury and soundtrack) awards at the “Cannes Film Festival”, “Saint Omer”, which won the )Grand Jury Prize) and the (Lion of the Future – Luigi De Laurentiis) Award from the “Venice Festival”, as well as “Banshees of Inisherin”, Winner of the (Best Actor and Best Screenplay) awards at the “Venice Film Festival”, and The Fabelmans, directed by the great Steven Spielberg, which opened the last festival session.

Two classic Egyptian cinema films have also been restored and re-presented to the public, namely “Diaries of a Deputy in the Countryside” by Tawfiq Saleh, and “A Song over the Passage” by Ali Abdel-Khalek.

Cairo International Film Festival is one of the oldest and most regular festivals in the Arab world and Africa. It acquires its unique status by being the only festival in the Arab and African region registered under Category “A” in the International Federation of Producers in Paris (FIAPF).

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Cairo International Film Festival