A film in the San Francisco International Film Festival. Presented in association with the Arab Film Festival. SKYY Prize Contender. West Coast Premiere. Sponsored by the Forum on Contemporary Europe, Mediterranean Studies Program, and Abassi Program in Islamic Studies at Stanford University.

About the Film

Kamel dreams of returning to Italy, where he once baked pizzas, this time leaving Algeria for good and bringing his girlfriend Zina with him. For this they will need papers, so the couple embarks on a journey from the urban center to deserted suburbs in search of the immigrant smuggler who can help them. The couple has grown up among the violence that has plagued Algeria for more than a decade and taken more than 100,000 lives. Ongoing strife between government forces and Islamist opposition is so much a part of day-to-day living that Kamel and Zina ignore the danger they face on the road and turn their quest into a kind of holiday. Director Tariq Teguia calls his debut feature "a slow-motion road movie," but it is a road movie only in abstract. Much of the travel takes place on streets without names or numbers and through a maze of buildings - a symbolic dead end. Short asides into the lives of Islamic fundamentalists and other would-be emigrants limn Algeria's dire situation and underline the desperation behind Kamel's desire to leave. Yet even as the pair's languid odyssey grows ever more quixotic, the drama never quite slips into tragedy, buoyed on by the lovers' uncomplaining acceptance of whatever fate throws them and an embrace of life that contains happiness and the possibility of a brighter future. In similar fashion, Teguia has fashioned a portrait of Algeria stunned and stunted by war that is more hopeful than bleak. - Pam Grady

Showtimes

Friday, April 27 / 9:15 / Kabuki / ROME27K

Saturday, May 5 / 2:00 / Kabuki / ROME 05K

Sunday, May 6 / 8:45 / Kabuki / ROME 06K

Tuesday, May 8 / 6:30 / Aquarius / ROME 08A

For more information, go to: http://fest07.sffs.org/films/film_details.php?id=94

How has Iran become the most serious foreign policy issue in Indonesian politics? Since democracy was restored to Indonesia in 1999, governments there have had to balance public demands for a strong, independent foreign policy against the reality that the economic and political crises of the past decade have limited Jakarta's influence in global politics. Earlier in this period, presidents and foreign ministers faced little more than sporadic challenges over issues that stood little chance of affecting Indonesian foreign policy beyond Southeast Asia. More recently, however, Iran has actively courted Indonesian legislative and civil society leaders, and they, in turn, have pressed their government to oppose international efforts to curb Tehran's nuclear programs. They sharply criticized the Yudhoyono government for failing to oppose a motion in the International Atomic Energy Agency to refer Iran to the UN Security Council in 2006. This year they triggered a heated debate by opposing the government's decision to join a unanimous Security Council vote that broadened sanctions on Iran. Prof. Malley will examine these trends and assess their implications for Indonesian foreign policy and international security.

Michael Malley teaches comparative and Southeast Asian politics at the Naval Postgraduate School in Monterey. Before joining the School in 2004, he taught at Ohio University. He earned a PhD in political science at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, an MA in Asian Studies at Cornell University, and a BS at Georgetown University's School of Foreign Service.

This is the Southeast Asia Forum's fifth seminar of the 2006-2007 academic year.