Beirut International Film Festival

Overview: Over the years, BIFF has hosted many international and Middle eastern names such as Abbas Kiarostami, Isabelle Huppert, Umbert Balsan, Yusra, Lebleba, Francis Ford Coppola, Juliette Binoche, Julie Gayet, Marco Mueller (Venice), Tom Luddy (Telluride)… In spite of the political and security situation in Lebanon, BIFF’s greatest success and pride is the number of guests who fall in love with BIFF and Lebanon and want to come back. All our past guests have become the most efficient PR machine for Lebanon and BIFF. They encourage their friends to come to Beirut and every year brings us more and more new friends. BIFF is equally very proud of bringing art house films to the Lebanese audience who would otherwise never have the chance to see these films. In addition, we are happy to mention several parallel achievements of BIFF: The introduction of Abbas Kiarostami to IESAV for the purpose of holding a workshop. This initiative resulted in two workshops given by Mr. Kiarostami over a period of two years. The introduction of several Lebanese filmmakers to international producers. This resulted in their feature films and other films being produced and launched into the international film festival circuit and market; the most outstanding of which being Ziad Doueiri for his latest film, and Karim Rahbani. Both films will be doing the international film festival rounds in 2017. Financial Information: BIFF survives entirely on sponsor generosity. All ticket sales go to cover the cost of the theaters and nothing else. Sponsor income covers screening fees for all films screened, additional equipment installed for the actual festival, guests’ airfares, hotel lodging, full board and local transport, and last but not least, the cost of the team organizing BIFF.