SUNDAY, march 22 / 4:00 pm / Ottawa Art Gallery

Program: Notes from a Poet, A Sad and Beautiful World

Feature presentation \

Cyril Aris’s fresh, energetic, and impressive debut feature film is a winning mixture of romantic comedy and serious drama revolving around a cinematic love story for the ages. Born in war-torn Beirut, Nino and Yasmina are childhood friends who fall in love in their schoolyard, dreaming of their adult lives and of the wonderful world that lies ahead of them. Separated after their school days by the vicissitudes of life, somehow miraculously and totally by chance they meet again twenty years later; Nino is now a restaurateur and Yasmina is a successful economic consultant. And just like that, it's love all over again—mad, magnetic, incandescent. But can they build a future together in their fractured country, a country you may try to leave but that holds you back so irresistibly? Never sentimental and haunted by a certain sadness about the constant and complex challenges faced by Lebanon, Aris’s captivating film is a superb piece of humanist cinema. More beautiful than sad, this remarkable film both embodies its title and is a resounding cinematic affirmation of the power of love and of home.

Tom McSorley

Short film \

Notes from a Poet

2025 / 8 minutes / Saskatchewan
Director: Simon Garez
Language: No dialogue

After discovering an enigmatic message in a library book, a quiet dreamer embarks on a quest to unlock its meaning.