Capernaum

Director: Nadine Labaki

2018 / 126min / DCP

A 12-year-old boy, Zain, condemned to a Beirut jail for an act of violence and poisoned by his life of poverty, sues his parents for neglect with the help of a TV channel that agrees to pay his legal fees in Labaki's devastating drama, which makes use of a flashback structure to trace its protagonist’s path towards his present imprisonment. Featuring performances of jarring authenticity from a cast largely made up of non-professional actors, Labaki’s compassionate, hectic tale of hard-knocks shantytown life connects to a long cinematic legacy of neorealism, while being also a work that belongs distinctly to the present moment—as attested to its arthouse sleeper hit status.

Part of Ethics of Care