Nadine Labaki & Khaled Mouzanar

In her films, Nadine Labaki brings attention to stories that counterbalance prevailing narratives and undermine the reality-controlling authority of dominant social and political systems. As a performer, Labaki similarly inhabits characters that often go unrepresented in popular culture, exposing the hardships of women burdened by personal predicaments that speak to broader societal problems like patriarchy, poverty, corruption, and war. With characters that demonstrate inspiring reserves of courage, moral integrity, hope, and resilience in the face of unimaginable suffering and pain, Labaki’s films provoke strong emotional responses that galvanize public opinions and spark new flares of activist fervor. (Recipient — director — of the Jury Prize at the Cannes Film Festival in 2018)