‘What’s left of the Egyptian revolution?’

Egyptian filmmaker Mohamed Siam and Belgian Middle East expert Ruth Vandewalle discuss the aftermath of the Arab revolution. Eight years after the outburst of the Arab Spring and the turmoil on Tahrir Square in Cairo, BOZAR considers it vital to screen Siam's documentary Amal, named after a 14-year-old girl who was beaten by police during the protests. The coming-of-age documentary follows Amal over the years after the revolution and her search for an identity in a country in transition. The screening will immediately be followed by the discussion, moderated by Middle East expert Brigitte Herremans.

Mohamed Siam is a fiction and documentary filmmaker. In addition to member of the Academy — the Oscars, he is a Sundance, IDFA and Fabrique des Cinémas du Monde Fellow. His films have been screened in NYFF, Karlovy Vary and Carthage, where he won The Golden Tanit in 2018 and Best Cinematography in 2017. His recent film Amal was the 2017 IDFA Opening Film. It won the Sheffield Jury Prize and the FidaDoc Award, the Robert Bosch Film Prize and the Thessaloniki award. Siam is a fellow scholar and filmmaker resident in the American University in Paris.

Ruth Vandewalle is a Belgian documentary maker and researcher. She finished her master's degree in Middle East Studies and Arabic in Cairo, where she has been based since 2009, and started working as a news producer during the Arab uprisings in 2011. Since then, she has covered the news from all over the Middle East, producing numerous reportages for different European media.