SAÏD EFFENDI

North American Premiere

After schoolteacher Saïd Effendi and his family are evicted from their home, they must settle into their modest new neighborhood in 1950s Baghdad. Already feeling like outsiders in their new community, tensions come to boiling point when the Effendi children butt heads with the cobbler's kids. Adapted from the short story "Fight" by writer Edmond Sabri, this landmark work of Iraqi cinema takes influence from Italian neorealist works of the early 1950s to explore one man's struggle to balance parenting, community harmony, and personal ethics.

Newly restored by the Iraqi Cinematheque Project, this hidden gem of cinematic history is premiering in North America for the first time after nearly 70 years at the Refocus Film Festival.