Hisham Bizri ( ar, هيشام البزري) is a film director, writer, producer, and scholar born in Beirut, Lebanon. Bizri began working in film in the US and

Hungary Hungary ( hu, Magyarország ) is a landlocked country in Central Europe. Spanning of the Pannonian Basin, Carpathian Basin, it is bordered by Slovakia to the north, Ukraine to the northeast, Romania to the east and southeast, Serbia to the ...

with filmmakers

Stan Brakhage James Stanley Brakhage ( ; January 14, 1933 – March 9, 2003) was an American filmmaker. He is considered to be one of the most important figures in 20th-century experimental film. Over the course of five decades, Brakhage created a larg ...

Raoul Ruiz __NOTOC__ Raoul is a French variant of the male given name Ralph or Rudolph, and a cognate of Raul. Raoul may also refer to: Given name * Raoul Berger, American legal scholar * Raoul Bova, Italian actor * Radulphus Brito (Raoul le Breton, died ...

, and

Miklós Jancsó Miklós Jancsó (; 27 September 192131 January 2014) was a Hungarian film director and screenwriter. Jancsó achieved international prominence starting in the mid-1960s with works including '' The Round-Up'' (''Szegénylegények'', 1965), '' ...

. Bizri has directed over 25 shorts and one feature film. His industry experience includes work as Producer at

Future TV Future Television ( ar, تلفزيون المستقبل, ''Televiziyon al-Mustaqbal'') was a Lebanese free-to-air television station founded in 1993 by the Future Movement leader Rafik Hariri, a former Prime Minister of Lebanon. Future TV was als ...

(Lebanon), Creative Director at

Orbit Communications Company Orbit Communications Company was a privately owned Pay TV network, operating in Bahrain. Owned by Saudi Arabia-based Mawarid Holding (via Digital Media Systems), it was the first fully digital, multi-channel, multi-lingual, pay television serv ...

(Rome/Dubai/Beirut/Cairo), and President & Creative Director o
Levantine Films
(NYC). Bizri also taught film for over two decades, most recently as Professor of Filmmaking and Screenwriting in the Literary Arts Department at Brown University. He previously taught at

the University of Minnesota The University of Minnesota, formally the University of Minnesota, Twin Cities, (UMN Twin Cities, the U of M, or Minnesota) is a public land-grant research university in the Twin Cities of Minneapolis and Saint Paul, Minnesota, United States. T ...

MIT The Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) is a private land-grant research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Established in 1861, MIT has played a key role in the development of modern technology and science, and is one of the m ...

UC Davis The University of California, Davis (UC Davis, UCD, or Davis) is a public land-grant research university near Davis, California. Named a Public Ivy, it is the northernmost of the ten campuses of the University of California system. The institut ...

NYU New York University (NYU) is a private research university in New York City. Chartered in 1831 by the New York State Legislature, NYU was founded by a group of New Yorkers led by then-Secretary of the Treasury Albert Gallatin. In 1832, the ...

Boston University Boston University (BU) is a Private university, private research university in Boston, Massachusetts. The university is nonsectarian, but has a historical affiliation with the United Methodist Church. It was founded in 1839 by Methodists with ...

, The School of the Museum of Fine Arts (Boston), and in

Lebanon Lebanon ( , ar, لُبْنَان, translit=lubnān, ), officially the Republic of Lebanon () or the Lebanese Republic, is a country in Western Asia. It is located between Syria to Lebanon–Syria border, the north and east and Israel to Blue ...

Korea Korea ( ko, 한국, or , ) is a peninsular region in East Asia. Since 1945, it has been divided at or near the 38th parallel, with North Korea (Democratic People's Republic of Korea) comprising its northern half and South Korea (Republic o ...

, Japan,

Ireland Ireland ( ; ga, Éire ; Ulster Scots dialect, Ulster-Scots: ) is an island in the Atlantic Ocean, North Atlantic Ocean, in Northwestern Europe, north-western Europe. It is separated from Great Britain to its east by the North Channel (Grea ...

, and

Jordan Jordan ( ar, الأردن; tr. ' ), officially the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan,; tr. ' is a country in Western Asia. It is situated at the crossroads of Asia, Africa, and Europe, within the Levant region, on the East Bank of the Jordan Rive ...

(where he also initiated a number of academic film programs). His students have gone on to study film at

, USC,

AFI AFI may refer to: * ''Address-family identifier'', a 16 bit field of the Routing Information Protocol * Ashton Fletcher Irwin, an Australian drummer * AFI (band), an American rock band ** ''AFI'' (2004 album), a retrospective album by AFI rele ...

UCLA The University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) is a public land-grant research university in Los Angeles, California. UCLA's academic roots were established in 1881 as a teachers college then known as the southern branch of the California ...

La Fémis La Fémis (French: ''École Nationale Supérieure des Métiers de l'Image et du Son''; "National Superior School for the Professions of Image and Sound", formerly known as the '' Institut des hautes études cinématographiques'', IDHEC) is a Fre ...

(

Paris Paris () is the Capital city, capital and List of communes in France with over 20,000 inhabitants, most populous city of France, with an estimated population of 2,165,423 residents in 2019 in an area of more than 105 km² (41 sq mi), ma ...

) and FAMU (

Prague Prague ( ; cs, Praha ; german: Prag, ; la, Praga) is the capital and List of cities in the Czech Republic, largest city in the Czech Republic, and the historical capital of Bohemia. On the Vltava river, Prague is home to about 1.3 milli ...

). In 2015, in response to the Syrian refugee crisis, Bizri partnered with Jordan'
Royal Film Commission
to produce documentaries by Arab filmmakers who chronicled life in the

Zaatari refugee camp The Zaatari refugee camp () is a refugee camp in Jordan, located east of Mafraq, which has gradually evolved into a permanent settlement;El-Bizri El-Bizri (البزري—البزرة) is an Arabic name. Historically, its members settled in Sidon, Lebanon with a large branch also growing in Damascus, Syria, and a much smaller presence in Acre, Israel, Acre ('Akka) mainly in pre-1948 Palestin ...

—who ultimately trace their lineage to the Imam al-Husayn bin 'Ali. The family has included public servants, politicians, and merchants since Ottoman times, with its political influence originally centered in

Sidon Sidon ( ; he, צִידוֹן, ''Ṣīḏōn'') known locally as Sayda or Saida ( ar, صيدا ''Ṣaydā''), is the third-largest city in Lebanon. It is located in the South Governorate, of which it is the capital, on the Mediterranean coast. ...

and Damascus. The youngest of seven children of Lebanese parents, Bizri was raised in Beirut during the

Lebanese Civil War The Lebanese Civil War ( ar, الحرب الأهلية اللبنانية, translit=Al-Ḥarb al-Ahliyyah al-Libnāniyyah) was a multifaceted armed conflict that took place from 1975 to 1990. It resulted in an estimated 120,000 fatalities a ...

and 1982 Israeli

Siege of Beirut The siege of Beirut took place in summer 1982, as part of the 1982 Lebanon War, which resulted from the breakdown of the ceasefire effected by the United Nations. The siege ended with the Palestinian Liberation Organization being forced out of Bei ...

. Bizri’s mother often would send him to the movie theater as an escape. The movie houses of Beirut introduced Bizri to: classic Hollywood films by D.W. Griffith, John Ford, Howard Hawks, George Cukor, and Chaplin; the European films of Ingmar Bergman, F. W. Murnau, and Roberto Rossellini; and many avant garde works, as well. Originally a student of physics and mathematics at American University in Beirut (AUB), Bizri was increasingly drawn to a career in film, eventually establishing a film club at AUB. Eager to obtain film training, the 19-year-old Bizri moved to Boston to study filmmaking at Boston University, from which he received his undergraduate degree, and completed post-graduate work at Harvard's Carpenter Center for the Arts and NYU's Tisch School before receiving his MFA from the University of Illinois at Chicago.

Film career

Bizri's films have been shown in international venues including Sundance,

Cannes Cannes ( , , ; oc, Canas) is a city located on the French Riviera. It is a commune located in the Alpes-Maritimes department, and host city of the annual Cannes Film Festival, Midem, and Cannes Lions International Festival of Creativity. T ...

Berlin Berlin ( , ) is the capital and List of cities in Germany by population, largest city of Germany by both area and population. Its 3.7 million inhabitants make it the European Union's List of cities in the European Union by population within ci ...

Oberhausen
(multiple times),

Moscow Moscow ( , US chiefly ; rus, links=no, Москва, r=Moskva, p=mɐskˈva, a=Москва.ogg) is the capital and largest city of Russia. The city stands on the Moskva River in Central Russia, with a population estimated at 13.0 millio ...

, and Abu Dhabi film festivals as well as the

Louvre The Louvre ( ), or the Louvre Museum ( ), is the world's most-visited museum, and an historic landmark in Paris, France. It is the home of some of the best-known works of art, including the ''Mona Lisa'' and the ''Venus de Milo''. A central l ...

Institut du Monde Arabe The ''Institut du Monde Arabe'', French for Arab World Institute, abbreviated ''IMA'', is an organization founded in Paris in 1980 by France with 18 Arab countries to research and disseminate information about the Arab world and its cultural an ...

Cinémathèque Française The Cinémathèque Française (), founded in 1936, is a French non-profit film organization that holds one of the largest archives of film documents and film-related objects in the world. Based in Paris's 12th arrondissement, the archive offers ...

Centre Pompidou The Centre Pompidou (), more fully the Centre national d'art et de culture Georges-Pompidou ( en, National Georges Pompidou Centre of Art and Culture), also known as the Pompidou Centre in English, is a complex building in the Beaubourg area of ...

, MoMa, and Anthology Film Archives (NYC). He is recipient of awards from the McKnight
LEFJerome
and

Rockefeller Rockefeller is a German surname, originally given to people from the village of Rockenfeld near Neuwied in the Rhineland and commonly referring to subjects associated with the Rockefeller family. It may refer to: People with the name Rockefeller f ...

Foundations, as well as fellowships from the Guggenheim Foundation, Bogliasco Foundation, and

American Academy in Rome The American Academy in Rome is a research and arts institution located on the Gianicolo (Janiculum Hill) in Rome. The academy is a member of the Council of American Overseas Research Centers. History In 1893, a group of American architects, ...

, which awarded him the "

Rome Prize The Rome Prize is awarded by the American Academy in Rome, in Rome, Italy. Approximately thirty scholars and artists are selected each year to receive a study fellowship at the academy. Prizes have been awarded annually since 1921, with a hiatus ...

" (FAAR 2009). Early in his career, Bizri served as Producer at Future TV (Lebanon) and Creative Director of Orbit Communications Company (Rome/Dubai/Beirut/Cairo). In 2005, he co-founded The Arab Institute of Film (Amman, Jordan) with the Syrian filmmaker

Omar Amiralay Omar Amiralay ( ar, عمر أميرالاي) (1944 – 5 February 2011) was a Syrian documentary film director and civil society activist. He is noted for the political criticism in his films, and played a prominent role in the events of the Da ...

and Danish producer Jakob Høgel, with support from the Danish government, International Media Support (Denmark), and the Ford Foundation. In 2012, he was named President & Creative Director o
Levantine Films
(NYC). Bizri cites

Henry James Henry James ( – ) was an American-British author. He is regarded as a key transitional figure between literary realism and literary modernism, and is considered by many to be among the greatest novelists in the English language. He was the ...

as a key figure in shaping some of his views on art and literature: “It is art that makes life, makes interest, makes importance… giving fresh meaning to contemporary life.” On his website, Bizri lists the films he appreciates, including: "Arabic Series" (Stan Brakhage, 1981), "Red River" ( Howard Hawks, 1946), "

The Sun Shines Bright ''The Sun Shines Bright'' is a 1953 American Comedy-Drama Western film directed by John Ford, based on material taken from a series of Irvin S. Cobb "Judge Priest" short stories featured in ''The Saturday Evening Post'' in the 1910s, specifica ...

" (

John Ford John Martin Feeney (February 1, 1894 – August 31, 1973), known professionally as John Ford, was an American film director and naval officer. He is widely regarded as one of the most important and influential filmmakers of his generation. He ...

, 1953), "Au Hasard, Balthazar" (

Robert Bresson Robert Bresson (; 25 September 1901 – 18 December 1999) was a French film director. Known for his ascetic approach, Bresson contributed notably to the art of cinema; his non-professional actors, ellipses, and sparse use of scoring have l ...

, 1966), "Gertrud" ( Carl Theodor Dreyer, 1964), "The 47 Ronin" (

Kenji Mizoguchi was a Japanese film director and screenwriter, who directed about one hundred films during his career between 1923 and 1956. His most acclaimed works include ''The Story of the Last Chrysanthemums'' (1939), '' The Life of Oharu'' (1952), ''Ugets ...

, 1942), " The Earrings of Madame de..." (

Max Ophuls Max or MAX may refer to: Animals * Max (dog) (1983–2013), at one time purported to be the world's oldest living dog * Max (English Springer Spaniel), the first pet dog to win the PDSA Order of Merit (animal equivalent of OBE) * Max (gorilla) ...

, 1953), " India: Matri Bhumi" (

Roberto Rossellini Roberto Gastone Zeffiro Rossellini (8 May 1906 – 3 June 1977) was an Italian film director, producer, and screenwriter. He was one of the most prominent directors of the Italian neorealist cinema, contributing to the movement with films such ...

, 1959),

The Tarnished Angels ''The Tarnished Angels'' is a 1957 black-and-white American CinemaScope drama film directed by Douglas Sirk and starring Rock Hudson, Robert Stack, Dorothy Malone, Jack Carson, and Robert Middleton. The screenplay by George Zuckerman is based on ...

(

Douglas Sirk Douglas Sirk (born Hans Detlef Sierck; 26 April 1897 – 14 January 1987) was a German film director best known for his work in Hollywood melodramas of the 1950s. Sirk started his career in Germany as a stage and screen director, but he left for ...

, 1957), and "

The Masseurs and a Woman is a 1938 Japanese comedy-drama film written and directed by Hiroshi Shimizu. Plot The movie opens with Toku and his fellow blind masseur friend Fuku walking down a mountain path, heading for a spa town where they have been hired to serve th ...

" ( Hiroshi Shimizu, 1938), as well as the films of D. W. Griffith and Gregory Markopoulos.Hisham Bizri's website "Favorites"
Retrieved 4 October 2015

Personal life

Bizri met his wife, a philosopher, in 1986, and they married in 1993.

Filmography

Selected films

Awards and honors

*Bogliasco Foundation Fellowship (2019) *Best Director (Tarkovsky Award) for "Night Shift,

(2017) * Best Editing Award for "Beneath the wide, wide, Heaven," RAIIFA International Film Festival (2016)
Salomon Faculty Research Award
Brown University (2015) * Script Station, Berlinale Talent Campus, Berlin International Film Festival (2011) * American Academy in Rome "Rome Prize" (2008) * McKnight Media Artist Award (2008) * Guggenheim Fellowship (2007) * Rockefeller Foundation Bellagio Fellowship (2005)

References

External links

* * * https://mimerafilms.com/about/ {{DEFAULTSORT:Bizri, Hisham 1966 births Living people Film directors from New York City American film producers American male screenwriters American people of Lebanese descent Brown University faculty English-language film directors Lebanese film directors Massachusetts Institute of Technology faculty University of Minnesota faculty Screenwriters from Massachusetts Screenwriters from Minnesota Screenwriters from Rhode Island