ENCOUNTERS 2024: BYE BYE TIBERIUS (with panel discussion)

Every year since our founding in 2010, The Bioscope has proudly hosted screenings of The Encounters South African International Documentary Festival. Now over 25 years old as a festival, Encounters returns to The Bioscope once again with screenings from 21 June - 30 July. Tickets are R80. For more information on the festival as a whole, please visit encounters.co.za

SEE THE FULL BIOSCOPE SCHEDULE FOR ENCOUNTERS HERE

BYE BYE TIBERIUS

Lina Soualem | France, Palestine, Belgium, Qatar | 2023 | 83 min

This intimately made film chronicles the life and family history of the great Palestinian actress Hiam Abbas, most familiar to mainstream Western audiences for her role as Marcia Roy in the TV series Succession. Abbas is an extraordinary actress with a remarkable presence and she has lived a deep and rich life that is well worth documenting. But what elevates Bye Bye Tiberias is the way its protagonist’s personal history is never separated from the deep cultural richness and political volatility of what we call the Middle East. Abbas has French and Israeli citizenship and was born to a family of Muslim Arabs in Nazareth, and so her very existence is deeply rooted in historical complexity. Directed and narrated by Abbas’ daughter, Lina Soualem, this timely documentary is bathed in the empathy of the personal, even as it cannot escape the fact that the place that birthed so many of Abbas’ memories is under existential threat.