Doors 6:00p
Program 6:15p
Tickets $12

UnionDocs
352 Onderdonk Ave
Ridgewood, NY

UnionDocs is delighted to come together with ArteEast to co-present the first of two screening from our program TO LEBANON, WITH LOVE, curated by Ginou Choueiri!

On October 5, the program features two short films by Lebanese filmmakers grappling with the seismic shifts surrounding the 2019 Lebanese uprising, each reflecting on resilience, imagination, and diaspora.

The evening begins with Ship of Fools (2024) by Alia Haju, in which the filmmaker turns to imagination as resistance. Encountering Abu Samra, a self-fashioned superhero, Haju captures the surreal humor and vulnerability of a people who persist in creating myths of survival. Through dreamlike encounters with personal and collective “monsters,” the film suggests that hope and resistance in Lebanon often takes shape within inner worlds as much as in public struggle.

The program continues with We Never Left (2024) by Loulwa Khoury, which shifts to the Lebanese diaspora in New York. Following three young expats as they rally for Lebanon from afar, the film underscores how political uprisings reverberate across borders and continents. Here, protest becomes both a transnational act of solidarity and a deeply personal negotiation of belonging.

The screening will be followed by a conversation with filmmakers Alia Haju and Loulwa Khoury.

Come through!

Join us again on October 6 for Day 2 of the program where we’ll be screening Diaries from Lebanon by Myriam El Hajj, with a performance/intervention by Perla Joe Maalouly—artist, activist, and protagonist of the film.

Program

Ship of Fools by Alia Haju

30 mins, 2024

Alia and the monsters that have accompanied her since childhood are all too familiar with the images of destruction and ruin that surround Beirut. Being born into a context of war forges certain shields – but also leaves behind vulnerabilities and private inner worlds. In one of these worlds, Alia meets Abu Samra, a man training to become a superhero in order to save Beirut from its many dangers. Abu Samra carries his own monsters, but from within the realm of imagination, he offers glimpses of resistance – even to the filmmaker herself, who steps into the frame.

We Never Left by Loulwa Khoury

83 mins, 2024

Saying goodbye to loved ones at the Beirut airport has become an unfortunate tradition in Lebanon, almost a curse. Lebanese emigrants, driven abroad by decades of turmoil, are more than double those still left in their homeland. After civil protests erupt in Lebanon on October 17th 2019, WE NEVER LEFT follows three young Lebanese expats as they take part in the Lebanese revolution from New York fighting for a better country, each protesting in their own way. As they go through their collective journey, they all individually confront both their relationship with their homeland and their own complicated identities. This is the story of the Lebanese people and revolutions both political and personal.

Program Duration: 113 mins

Bios

Alia Haju is a Brooklyn-based musician and filmmaker. Born in 86’ in South Lebanon and lived there until 1994 when she fled, during the Israeli war on Lebanon, to the UAE and later the US. In 2005 she moved back to Beirut and worked as a visual-journalist covering SWANA. She is director of award winning Ship of Fools’ short and co-author of award-winning feature-doc Kashkash. Musically, Alia performed with her Band ‘Taktouka’ and other bands on famous stages like Lincoln Center, Great American Music Hall, and the Joshua Tree Music Festival.

Loulwa Khoury is a New York based film editor, filmmaker born and raised in Beirut. She edited award-winning feature documentaries Paradise Without People (2019), Dusty and Stones (2022). She also edited Traces of Home and Joy Dancer. She is currently directing her first feature documentary, We Never Left. Her other work includes award-winning documentaries Some Kind of Heaven (2020), City of Ghosts (2017) It Will Be Chaos (2018) and An Act of Worship (2022), White Sauce Hot Sauce (2018), The Joneses (2016) and Look At Us Now, Mother (2015). She was one of the fellows of the Karen Schmeer Editing Fellowship and a fellow in the Sundance Co//ab Art of Editing Fellowship, in the DOC NYC x VC Storytelling Incubator cohort as well as a winner of the Creative Power Award.