May physical media picks, from indigenous Algerian funk to Graydon Carter's memoir
As physical media continues its comeback, The National rounds up the best releases across film, music, art and more. Algeria has a rich musical heritage – much of which the world has yet to discover. For instance, The music of the Kabyle people, indigenous to the north of the country, features some of the funkiest grooves in North Africa. Curious? Pick up Album No 1 by Kabyle group Les Abranis, a hidden gem released in 1983 and long circulated only within Algerian communities in France and the Maghreb region. While the band was popular in Algeria, they also faced opposition from the country's authorities, who viewed them as a societal threat due to their use of the Kabyle language, instead of Arabic. Reissued for the first time since its original release by Wewantsounds, this is a must-have for fans of so-called habibi funk. William Mullally, arts and culture editor I absolutely love Chilean-American author Isabel Allende – both Of Love and Shadows (De amor y de sombra) and The House of the Spirits (La casa de los espiritus) are novels I have come back to many times over the years. This May, she is releasing a new novel, My Name Is Emilia del Valle (Mi nombre es Emilia del Valle). Set in San Francisco and Chile in the 19th century, the story follows the eponymous Emilia Del Valle, daughter of an Irish nun, who is abandoned by her Chilean aristocrat partner. Emilia grows up to be a writer forced to publish her work under a male pseudonym and later as a journalist. Her work eventually takes her to Chile, where she sets out to uncover her family's roots. Farah Andrews, head of features Anytime I hear the expression 'they don't make 'em like they used to' I think of Graydon Carter, the legendary Canadian editor of Vanity Fair and Life. The brilliantly titled When the Going Was Good is his new memoir and it offers a lavish, name-dropping romp through the golden age of magazine publishing. From the hallways of Time in the 1970s to the seemingly endless budgets of Vanity Fair in its heyday, Carter tells tales – and he can certainly tell a tale – of decades of journalistic excess and achievement with disarming candour and sharp wit. He dishes on other luminaries - Anna Wintour, Princess Margaret and Christopher Hitchens - with relish, sparing no one, least of all himself. The book is rich with scandalous anecdotes, from sky-high expense accounts to Oscar party hijinks, but what lingers is Carter's irreverent joy in the trade. As co-founder of Spy, he helped to coin some long-lasting zingers aimed at then property developer Donald Trump – and the animosity lives on to this day. But beneath the glamour and high-society gossip lies a portrait of a bygone era when editors took wild risks and journalism was, in Carter's words, 'just plain fun". It is a compulsively readable love letter to an industry that is today – in the age of AI, algorithms and efficiency – a different beast altogether. Nasri Atallah, editor of The National's Luxury magazine Abbas Kiarostami is rightfully considered the cream of the rich Iranian film director crop and, while The Wind Will Carry Us may not be the best introduction to his oeuvre – that honour goes to Close Up – this contemplative masterpiece is essential viewing. The story follows an undercover documentarian (Behzad Dorani) who is assigned to cover a small village's funeral rites, but is continually frustrated because his potential subject, a sickly elderly woman, refuses to die. William Mullally, arts & culture editor Marco Brambilla's Demolition Man, starring Sylvester Stallone and Wesley Snipes, is not your average 1990s action sci-fi film. It barely broke even after its theatrical release, but its magic and the appreciation of audiences grew on home video. Set in 2032, a police officer is awoken from his frozen state to pursue a criminal from his own time. In this future, crime is all but eradicated, but Snipes, the criminal from the past, wreaks havoc on the peaceful society. The expertise and know-how of Stallone's character, John Spartan, is needed to pursue the criminal who uses methods all but unknown to the future. The film has been praised in recent times for predicting futuristic technology including video conferencing and social media. Demolition Man has been remastered in 4K by Arrow Video. Faisal Al Zaabi, gaming and social media writer
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The National
4 hours ago
- The National
Stanley Tucci doesn't want to be globetrotting food expert like Anthony Bourdain
Stanley Tucci has a lot of time to think, and he hates it. The American actor, 64, has spent the majority of his life making movies – Conclave, The Devil Wears Prada, The Hunger Games, to name a few – and as much as he loves acting, he laments the fact that he doesn't actually do all that much of it. 'Acting doesn't fulfil me as much as it used to,' Tucci tells The National. 'You're on these sets for 12 to 13 hours a day, and you may only act for 20 minutes of that time. I end up thinking, 'there's got to be a better way to do this!' I just want to keep going and going – I'm very impatient. 'I get paid to wait. It's the acting I do for free. That's the way I feel, at this point.' The problem is, when you're sitting around all day, you're rarely learning something – even about yourself. It's a problem we all have – but he has lost patience with that disconnect. Which is why, over the last decade, Tucci has gone out into the world to learn more about who he really is – through travel and especially through food. 'I think we've gotten out of touch with ourselves physically,' Tucci explains. 'One of the reasons is we're all sitting in front of computers, or on our phones all the time – or myself, waiting on a set – and desk work is far more prominent than doing any kind of labour.' In Tucci's mind, it's all connected. By focusing more on what he eats, he's thought more about where it comes from – the land, and the culture and traditions the land inspires. And by starting at the source, we see ourselves more clearly. 'Getting in touch with the land is so important. From the land comes our food, and then the food goes onto the table, and into us,' says Tucci. Growing up, Tucci was also quite disconnected from his roots. He didn't understand why all the other kids at his small-town school 75km outside of New York City were eating peanut butter and jelly sandwiches and he was having leftovers his mother had packed him of last night's eggplant parmigiana. But with each passing decade, he has increasingly immersed himself in his Italian heritage – and embracing even its flaws. And by focusing his journey on food, he has ended up learning more about the country's rich complexities than one might imagine. All of this is in service to understanding the country – and himself – better. 'I don't want to romanticise Italy. I think that's been done ad nauseam. I think it's not interesting and it's not truthful,' says Tucci. Tucci in Italy, his new National Geographic series broadcast weekly in the UAE and available to stream on Disney+, embraces what he feels is the true Italy. In the first episode, for example, he explores Tuscany, focusing specifically on dishes that were created by and for the working class. First he tries lampredotto, the Florentine street food sandwich made from the fourth stomach of a cow. It's named after the eels that once inhabited the Arno river, and only the rich could afford. The tripe dish, then, was invented to imitate its flavours. But the story doesn't stop here. Tucci then finds another old peasant dish made with imitation tripe by those that couldn't even afford cow stomach. That one might even be his favourite. Politically speaking, there's a reason that he focuses on the lower class – at a time when, once again, immigrants and the poor are being scapegoated, both in Italy and in the US. It's something his immigrant family likely went through once, too. 'I think particularly in today's climate, immigrants are vilified and wrongly so, because they have so much to bring to a culture. Millions of Italians once came over to America, and they were vilified to a certain extent. Also, I think that's something that Italian Americans have to remember, and Italians themselves should remember, too,' says Tucci. But as much as he's enjoyed diving into the unexplored corners of Italy for the series – with another season already shot and set to air next year – he's also adamant that his journey will stop there. While he wants to go deeper into his ancestral homeland, a project he started with the CNN series Stanley Tucci: Searching for Italy in 2021, he doesn't want to explore the rest of the world on camera. It's clear he doesn't want to be the next Anthony Bourdain – the late chef who grew internationally famous for his globetrotting food series Parts Unknown. 'I don't want to do different regions and different countries, because I don't think that would be appropriate. I don't have a connection to those countries,' Tucci explains. In fact, it sounds like Tucci doesn't think there should be another Anthony Bourdain at all. 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'As a person who's getting older, your body is changing all the time – meaning it's getting weaker all the time. You need to know what it is you need to strengthen yourself - to keep yourself strong. Otherwise I'll grow impatient with myself, too.'
Sharjah 24
14 hours ago
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Resilient indie cinema thriving in Cairo
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Campaign ME
14 hours ago
- Campaign ME
beIN, Sony Pictures Entertainment extend content deal across MENA
beIN Media Group has extended its longstanding content agreement with Sony Pictures Entertainment (SPE), securing exclusive multi-year rights to a broad portfolio of acclaimed television series and films which will come to beIN's audiences across the Middle East and North Africa (MENA), and Turkey. As part of the renewed deal, beIN will continue to hold first and second window rights to several film titles from SPE's diverse library. In the Middle East, content will be available in both Arabic and English across beIN's entertainment channels, beIN ON DEMAND, and on its OTT platforms, TOD and beIN CONNECT. In Turkey, content will be available in English and Turkish via Digiturk's entertainment channels, as well as TOD and beIN CONNECT. 'We are proud to extend our valued relationship with Sony Pictures Entertainment — a creative powerhouse that continues to captivate global audiences,' said Esra Özaral Altop, Chief Entertainment Content Officer, beIN Media Group. 'This renewed agreement not only reflects our dedication to curating premium entertainment for viewers across MENA and Türkiye, but also marks a new chapter in strengthening our entertainment portfolio.' SPE's upcoming slate includes highly anticipated titles such as I Know What You Did Last Summer, 28 Years Later, Until Dawn, and Karate Kid: Legends. The agreement could also allow audiences to watch recent hits like Venom: The Last Dance, Kraven the Hunter, Saturday Night, the Oscar-winning I'm Still Here, and Paddington in Peru coming to beIN's audiences. For television series, the agreement covers fan-favourites including Outlander (Seasons 1-8), The Good Doctor (Seasons 1-7), Twisted Metal (Season 1-2), and anime hits from Crunchyroll: Jujutsu Kaisen and My Hero Academia (Seasons 1-2). 'Our passion at Sony Pictures is to bring great stories to great audiences, and our friends and partners at beIN remain the perfect home to bring this plethora of amazing content to audiences across MENA and Turkey,' said Mark Young, EVP, Distribution & Networks, EMEA, Sony Pictures Television. 'We are thrilled that their wide audiences will continue to enjoy the wealth of content from SPE's future slate as well as our vast library of beloved classics, and we join them in being incredibly pleased to make this announcement today' First signed in 2021, the renewed agreement aims to build on the longstanding collaboration between beIN and SPE, while underscoring beIN's position as a global entertainment network.
