“Siempre nos quedará Beirut” explores the violent episodes suffered in Lebanon since 1975, demonstrating how films—forming a complete and diverse body of work—serve as a tool to preserve the intimate, collective, and national memory of a country. Throughout its chapters, we witness how Lebanese civil society, particularly its filmmakers, respond to the horrors of war. Despite religious or social class differences among them, their collective work creates a regional historical memory that reflects and contemplates how civil society not only resists violence but also builds and rebuilds what it destroys.

Far from silence or propaganda, Lebanese cinema questions and makes public what happens behind closed doors, documenting the untold stories not covered by news reports, capturing the daily realities impacted by political decisions of a global system that disregards the lives of people and their simplest yet deepest desires.

This book is an essential work for anyone wanting to delve into the contemporary history of the Middle East and global cinema.

Laila Hotait starting out as a filmmaker on Al Jazeera’s Children’s Channel, Laila Hotmail has undertaken a wide variety of creative activities throughout her career. She has worked for Cinepolis as a scriptwriter, for Amnesty International as creative director of two campaigns in 2019 and 2021, at La Rueda Creative Studio as director of the film department and, now, she has created her own production company, called LAAVENTURA. At LAAVENTURA, Laila has the freedom to produce her own projects with the support of various sponsors. He is currently setting up a new company, together with his sister, called FICCIONA, dedicated to audiovisual development.

Laila’s recent addition to the IE University faculty came from a colleague in the industry. She contacted Iôna de Macêdo through LinkedIn and, inspired by her work at our university, invited her to meet for coffee. After some time and, after an interview, Iôna proposed to Laila to create a subject on the audiovisual production process and teach it at IE University.

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