Arava International Film Festival expands to two outdoor screens for 15th edition in November

The 15th Arava International Film Festival will take place November 4-14 beside the Nahal Ashush Nature Reserve, near Tzukim, with Israeli premieres, international films, classics, and programs highlighting filmmaking in the Negev, all shown in a magical atmosphere beneath the desert sky.

For the first time, the festival will feature two outdoor screens, allowing it to expand its selection and offer a more varied program each evening.

Film producer Eyal Shiray founded the festival in 2012 in partnership with the Central Arava Regional Council.

The opening evening, November 4, will focus on films made with support from the Negev Film Fund and shot in the Israeli desert.

Ruthy Pribar’s feature What is to Come, starring Ronit Yudkevitch, follows a woman who finds herself alone after 40 years of marriage and embarks on a journey of rediscovery.

Israeli cinema, emerging Negev filmmakers

Shiran Sheharbani’s Zebras follows three childhood friends, now 22, who hitchhike to a desert costume party and discover that their long friendship is changing.

The accompanying Short in the Desert program includes four locally made shorts, including one that was created at a filmmaking incubator for women from the Negev’s Bedouin community.

The Israeli selection also includes Assaf Machnes’s Where To, which premiered at Berlin and won the Best Actor and Best Supporting Actor Ophir Awards for Ehab Salami and Ido Tako, respectively.

For the 10th time, the festival will host a seminar for high school film students, bringing participants from across Israel together with filmmakers and industry professionals through encounters with contemporary and classic cinema.

Billy Wilder retrospective honors late film adviser Edna Fainaru

A Billy Wilder retrospective will honor journalist and artistic adviser Edna Fainaru, who died in June and helped shape the festival’s program alongside her husband, Dan Fainaru.

Over more than six decades, she worked as a journalist, editor, and festival adviser, contributing to Variety and Screen International. The couple founded Cinematheque magazine in 1982.

The tribute features Double Indemnity, Sabrina, Some Like It Hot, and The Apartment. Other classics include restored versions of Ingmar Bergman’s The Seventh Seal, Sergio Leone’s The Good, the Bad and the Ugly, and Martin Scorsese’s After Hours.

Nine Israeli premieres headline international film lineup

The international lineup includes nine Israeli premieres, among them May el-Toukhy’s Woman Unknown, Florian Zeller’s Bunker, starring Javier Bardem and Penélope Cruz, and Peter Farrelly’s I Play Rocky.

Georgian director Levan Koguashvili will attend Guria screenings with cast and crew.

Family programming includes animated films and the original Mary Poppins.

The festival is supported by the Central Arava Regional Council, the Culture and Sport Ministry’s Israel Film Council, the Development of the Negev and Galilee Ministry, the Tourism Ministry, the Regional Cooperation Ministry, and the Mifal Hapayis national lottery.

These bodies join the regional council’s founding partnership with Shiray in supporting the event, whose expanded format will bring additional screenings to the desert venue this year.