Abdellatif Abdelhamid عبد اللطيف عبد الحميد |
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Born | January 5, 1954 Homs, Syria |
Years active | 1981—present |
Awards | Montpellier Mediterranean Film Festival - Critics Award 1993 Rasael Shafahiyyah Muscat Film Festival - Best Director 2001 Qamaran wa Zaytouna Singapore International Film Festival - Special Jury Prize 2007 Kharej al-Taghtiya |
Abdellatif Abdelhamid (Arabic: عبد اللطيف عبد الحميد) is one of Syria's most prominent film directors. His films have earned numerous awards in the Arab world, beginning with the Damascus International Film Festival, the Carthage Film Festival, and Rabat International Film Festival.
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Abdelhamid worked as an actor, musician and singer in the theaters of his hometown, Latakia, prior to pursuing studies in film directing. Two years after enrolling in Tishreen University to study Arabic literature, he earned a scholarship to study film directing at the Gerasimov Institute of Cinematography, where he graduated in 1981.
He has directed two short documentaries for the National Organization for Cinema in Syria. He worked as an assistant director to Mohamed Malas on Ahlam al-Madina. He also played the lead role in Usama Muhammad's Nujoum al- Nahar. Among Syrian filmmakers his work has garnered the widest popular appeal in Syria and the Arab world. He has authored the scripts of all his films. His films have also received critical acclaim worldwide: Verbal Letters received the Golden Olive at the Valencia Mediterranean Film Festival in 1992, and At Our Listeners' Request received the Special Acknowledgmentment at the Asiatica Film Mediale in Italy in 2003, "for the lyricism with which he was capable of describing the tricks of fortune and the reality of war."