The San Diego Arab Film Festival presents films from and about the Arab World. The Festival includes 8 screenings over 5 nights. Tickets may be purchased for each screening as well as for 2 packages at discounted prices, one package is a festival pass for all 8 screenings and one for 3 tickets of your choice. Also available for purchase is a Palestinian dinner (served cafeteria style) The menu varies for each night.

Tonight, the first screening includes the short Dance! and the feature film The President’s Cake. The second screening includes the short The Pail and the feature film Calle Malaga.. The dinner menu will include Moroccan tagine, one version with meat and one vegetarian.

Screening #1 starts at 4:40 PM.

Dance! Directed by Poorya Dehghan (8 min)

Dance! is a short film from Iran about an Israeli officer who in order to escape a patrol goes to an abandoned house in Gaza However, the spirits of those killed in the house are waiting for him.

The President’s Cake directed by Hasan Hadi (102 min)

It's "draw day" across Iraq, when schools select students for the honor of bringing items to their mandatory local celebrations of President Saddam Hussein's birthday. Nine-year-old Lamia lives in the historic marshes with her spirited grandmother, Bibi. Before school, Bibi teaches Lamia clever tricks to avoid being chosen for the president's cake. However, when Musa, the authoritative teacher, calls Lamia's name for the most challenging task--the birthday cake--she has no choice but to accept. Refusing could mean imprisonment or even death.

The President’s Cake, Iraq’s submission to the Oscars, was shortlisted for Best International Feature.

Screening #2 starts at 7:03 PM

The Pail directed by Adel Mohammed Al-Haimi (7 min)

The Pail is a Yemeni documentary short film focusing on Hajj Abdullah, an elderly man who has spent over 60 years restoring the historic buildings of Sana'a. The 4-minute film highlights the profound bond between its subject and the ancient city's heritage.

Calle Malaga directed by Maryam Touzani (116 min)

María Ángeles (Carmen Maura) is a fiercely independent senior living in the Spanish quarter of Tangier. When her daughter Clara (Marta Etura) arrives for a long-overdue visit, she comes with an agenda: to pressure María into selling the home — left in Clara’s name by her late father — to offset her own post-divorce financial struggles. But María, deeply embedded in her community and cherished by her neighbors, quietly resolves to stay.

Determined not to be displaced, she devises a resourceful plan to earn enough money to keep the apartment and buy back the cherished belongings her daughter hastily sold to an antique dealer in preparation for the sale of the property. In the process, María unexpectedly finds a romantic spark with someone she once viewed as an adversary.

Calle Malaga was the official submission to the Oscars for the Best International Film.

Dinner is available from 3:50 PM until 7:15 PM.