ADVERTISEMENT

Award for Egyptian film industry stalwart

The Asia Pacific Screen Academy and FIAPF have announced Esaad Younis, a champion of the Egyptian film industry, as the 2015 recipient of the FIAPF Award for Outstanding Achievement in Film in the Asia Pacific region.

Brisbane Lord Mayor Graham Quirk will welcome Mrs Younis to Brisbane to accept the award at the 9th annual Asia Pacific Screen Awards (APSA) ceremony at Brisbane’s City Hall on November 26.

Together with the APSA nominees and APSA International Jury members, Esaad Younis will be inducted into the APSA Academy by the president, Jack Thompson. The Academy now boasts over 870 of the region's leading filmmakers and provides exclusive networking, development and funding opportunities available to Academy members.

FIAPF President, Luis Alberto Scalella said "Together with FIAPF's Members, I am delighted to honour the iconic Esaad Younis at the Asia Pacific Screen Awards this year. Esaad Younis' impressive career combines passion for films and for her country as well as dedication for defending a prosperous and creative film industry in Egypt and in the Asia Pacific region. We are proud that Esaad Younis has accepted the FIAPF Award for Outstanding Achievement in Film."

Chairman of the Asia Pacific Screen Awards and its Academy, Michael Hawkins said “The FIAPF Award, together with the APSA UNESCO Award, are two special awards which have been presented annually representing APSA’s founding partnerships. Both FIAPF and UNESCO have been instrumental in APSA’s core mission, and together we celebrate outstanding contribution both to industry development, and cultural preservation.”

A multi-talented and multi-faceted champion of Egyptian film and television, Esaad Younis has played many roles within this industry. Her impressive reputation as producer, distributor, screenwriter, comedienne, actress, talk show host and social commentator has been, in recent years, augmented by her pioneering work as a global campaigner against intellectual property theft (piracy).

In 2000 Younis co-founded and was appointed CEO of Al Arabia Cinema, one of the largest producers, distributors and exhibitors in Egypt. Under her leadership, Al Arabia Cinema has distributed more than 500 films, and has produced close to 100. Al Arabia is known for promoting the diversity of Egyptian cinema with films spanning all genres from blockbusters such as Alzheimer starring mega-star Adel Emam to critically acclaimed festival favourites like Dawoud Abdel Sayed’s Messages from the Sea which screened at festivals around the world and was selected as Egypt's official submission for Best Foreign Language Film at the 83rd Academy Awards®.

As the Vice President of the Egyptian Chamber of Cinema Younis has been a leader in developing, promoting and preserving the Egyptian cinema industry, and is a vocal and high-visibility defender of the rights of artists, leading the war against piracy, pursuing dozens of illegal internet download sites and also satellite service channels illegally broadcasting Egyptian films.

Speaking at the World Intellectual Property Organisation Conference in 2011, Younis urged audiences to consider the erosion of culture which is the necessary result of undermining copyright. Her passion and ongoing commitment to the campaign is internationally respected.

Esaad Younis joins the list of respected film practitioners from Asia Pacific who have been honoured with the FIAPF Award over the previous 8 years.  They are:

2014: Emile Sherman (Australia)
2013: Lee Choon-yun (Republic of Korea)
2012: Ryuichi Sakamoto (Japan)
2011: Zhang Yimou (People's Republic of China)
2010: Christine Hakim (Indonesia)
2009: Isao Matsuoka (Japan)
2008: Yash Chopra (India)
2007: Dr George Miller (Australia)

The Asia Pacific Screen Awards are the region’s highest accolade in film, and now in its 9th edition, the nominees represent 39 films from 22 countries and areas of Asia Pacific.

Winners in the feature film award achievements will be determined by the 2015 APSA International Jury, headed by APSA patron and Korean film industry legend Kim Dong-Ho. Kim is joined on the APSA International Jury by Iranian actress Negar Javaherian, writer/director Mostofa Sarwar Farooki (Bangladesh), director/writer/curator/producer and Beijing Film Academy Professor, Zhang Xianmin (People’s Republic of China), leading figure of Malaysian new wave cinema, writer/director, U-Wei Bin HajiSaari and Russian writer/director Alexei Popogrebsky, who represents APSA’s Academy alliance with the European Film Academy (EFA).

The 2015 APSA Youth, Animation and Documentary International Jury is chaired by writer/director/producer Shawkat Amin Korki (Iraqi Kurdistan), winner of the 2015 APSA UNESCO Award for Memories on Stone. Korki will be joined on the jury by Yuka Sakano (Japan), head of international relations for the Kawakita Memorial Film Institute in Tokyo, and Sam Ho (Hong Kong, PRC), a curator, researcher, teacher, writer and critic specialising in Hong Kong cinema.