Joanna Hogg Leads Feature Jury at El Gouna Film Festival
British director Joanna Hogg is president of the Feature Narrative Competition jury at the ninth El Gouna Film Festival in Egypt. Variety reports that it is her first visit to the country.
The festival runs from October 15 to 23 on Egypt's Red Sea coast. Its jury picks the winners in the feature competition, which is one of the main prizes on the programme.
Hogg's best-known work includes "The Souvenir," "The Souvenir Part II" and "The Eternal Daughter." Her 2007 debut, "Unrelated," was produced by Barbara Stone. Her working relationship with the actor Tilda Swinton goes back to "Caprice," Hogg's 1986 graduation film. The two later worked together again on the "Souvenir" films and on "The Eternal Daughter." Variety reports that Hogg is currently writing her next film.
She also has an unusual approach to watching films. Hogg told Variety that she prefers to know as little as possible before a film starts, "not even a synopsis of the story." A synopsis is a short plot summary, the kind printed in programme notes. For a jury member, that means arriving at each screening with no advance summary to shape what she expects.
Other prizes and programmes were announced during the festival. The festival's own website says CineGouna Funding has named the full list of winners in its 9th edition, with total awards of more than $350,000. Fares El Tabey won the third Eish Short Film Competition for his film concept "Between Two Shores." The award was announced by the United Nations World Food Programme in Egypt, the festival and Zest. The festival also said it will work with Zawya Cinema in Cairo for a fourth straight year. Its CineGouna Emerge Program has released the lineup for its fourth edition, and the CineGouna Forum, the industry meeting space, ran its sessions from October 16 to 22.
Hogg's presence gives the feature jury a director who has spent much of her career with a small circle of collaborators. Her films have drawn attention for their quiet, close observation of everyday life, and her next project is still in the writing stage.
