— My name is Noel Bassil, I am a lebanese filmmaker living in Dubai, I work as head of creative and promo department in a production company in Dubai.
I studied Cinema-Television in Lebanon and I graduated in 2016 with many student short films as university projects and a final short movie project named "KAFARTOU" ( which was a silent experimental movie that was directed and acted by me , with the help of an amazing team , the film was shot in Dubai's desert "EMPTY QUARTER" , which was really a hard shooting set when taking in consideration the Heat and the difficulties to move your equipments in the deep desert )
knowing that cinema in arab world is not yet an industry as it is elsewhere, i work more on commercials and Promotional videos to earn money ( as a job ) .
In order to nourish my love of cinema and my passion, I try every now and then to make a personal independent short movie.

— There is a cool story behind this movie. I was always passionate about discovering more about Lonely people who have pushed their loneliness to become a disease , especially genius people.
This movie was made for the "48 hours film project of Dubai 2019", so what is important and exciting about this project is that the script was written, the set was build, the casting was made, the film was shot, edited, colored, sound design and graphics were made on set, subtitled and delivered all in 48 hours (exactly 48 hours).
So because the rules of 48HFP are strict and you know nothing about your movie until the draw begin 48 hours prior to the delivery date, the script was written to what can be compatible with what i got in the draw:
- genre : Fantasy
- character : KAMAL KHOURI ( math genius )
- line of dialogue : "Can you hold this for a moment?"
- prop : Light bulb
All these elements should appear properly in my film while respecting the main genre which is fantasy.
I would like to mention that my film won :
- Audience award (48 hours film project Dubai 2019 )
- Best Film award (48 hours film project Dubai 2019 )
- Best actor award (48 hours film project Dubai 2019 )
- Nominated for all the other awards in the competition ( best directing - best cinematography - best use of character - best set design ...)
- Official selection ( Filmapalooza Rotterdam 2020 )
- Nominated for Best Actor award and Best Cinematography award ( Filmapalooza Rotterdam 2020 ) while competing with more than 138 movies from 138 countries.

— Producing the film was not that easy , because I wanted all the team to be working for free ( no one was getting paid to be part of the crew or cast of this film )
- all the decoration set was either gathered from me and the teams homes and some props were found in the street (abandoned )
- equipment were provided by the company am working with
- script was written over night and at 6 am sharp we started our first scene
- our main character was part of the script writing process (he is a professional actor in Lebanon and a good friend as well)
- no one of the crew slept for 48 hours and everyone was doing his best on the set ( because every minute lost and lead us to not delivering on time , will cost us a disqualification from the competition )
- an edit suite and a coloring suite was prepared on set and after each scene the editor will collect the material and start his rough cut.
- subtitling was made in the car on the way to delivering the film.

— A lot of funny moments happened on set, especially when our main cast had to talk with a turtle and a sculpture and imagine what they are responding to .
by the way the voice of the turtle and sculpture was made by me.
A scary moment i will never forget : the moment i was exporting the movie in the car, i had only 10 minutes left , and the system crashed. so i had to re-export again while not knowing if the export will end before the deadline or not.

— That's a tough question! Everyone has not only A DREAM but many, but if i want to highlight one of them, my dream will be " being able to show the whole world my vision and my thoughts and my perspective of this world using only my cinema language ".
I dream of having the opportunity of following my passion till the end, so one day, when i become old my children will remember me through my movies.

— I guess I can never answer that question, because I feel I have a lot of favourite movies, from different genres and different film schools .
I am a big fan of :
Stanley Kubrick ("Eyes wide shut")
Martin Scorsese ("Raging bull" - "Taxi Driver" - "Hugo" - "Shutter Island" )
Quentin Tarantino ("Pulp fiction" - "The hateful eight" )
Andrei Tarkovsky ("The Mirror" )
Alexander Sokurov ("Russian Ark")
Lars von Trier ("Melancholia")
i guess if i continue I will not finish, because taking cinema as your passion and career will lead you to falling in love with any beautiful artwork.

— Making a film will always start with having a story to tell, if you find it interesting then the audience will. Even if the audience doesn't care about your story, the way you tell it will make the whole difference.
- Gathering and working with a team that believes in your vision and always puts their full power into making your movie in its best shape, is the secret behind every successful film.
- Don't be afraid to put your crazy late night thoughts on a paper because these ideas will let your film have a signature that your audience will search for when they watch your future projects.
- Try and keep trying ( doing small projects with friends , will let you learn and experience methods that you can't try on a professional set unless you did it wrong many times and you learned how to master it .
- Keep a booknote and a pen with you always and note down any catchy, emotional, funny, scary, romantic, real situation you see in your daily life. because that's what will make your future film more genuine and authentic.
- Cinema is fictional, but even if your film is not based on a real story, it can always feel, look, sound real. As if it really happened. And again if you can believe it , your audience will.