Zenloop Productions AB

Film production company based in Stockholm, Produces Documentaries and animation films, and specialises in colour grading and post-production services.

NEWS

We are honored that our documentary trilogy "On The Edge of Life" by Yaser Kassab and Rima Al-hamedd has been featured in Eleni Giakouvaki's article, Contemplations on Belonging, for the Swedish Film Institute Swedish Film Institute . Many thanks for the thoughtful piece and insightful reflections on themes of displacement and identity!

Contemplations on belonging - SFdbWe live in the era of movement. People and ideas constantly move, transforming themselves and their surroundings to a level that goes beyond the nation-state. The national is not irrelevant, at least while borders define people’s lives, but there are new perspectives to be found. Art positions itself in the center of the new cultural […]

"Chasing the Dazzling Light" at Syrian Doc Days Copenhagen.

Saturday 14e Sep , 19.30: + talk / SDD24

Arabiske stemmer 1. — 29. sep.I år byder festivalen på 15 film og to særligt fremtrædende temaer: Syrien (lanceret i samarbejde med Syrian Doc Days og foreningen Finjan) og dansk-arabisk kultur, personificeret i bl.a. instruktører som Omar Shargawi og folk, der kendte digteren Yahya Hassan godt.

"Chasing the Dazzling Light" at Venice Biennale Arte 2024
Friday 14 June
On view at ACP at Palazzo Franchetti in Venice, the exhibition highlights works by more than 40 filmmakers and video artists.

Coinciding with the 60th International Art Exhibition at the Venice Biennale, Your Ghosts Are Mine – Expanded Cinemas, Amplified Voices brings the visions of dozens of filmmakers and video artists from the Middle East, Africa and Southeast Asia to the art world’s most prestigious stage. It includes selected films supported, co-financed or initiated by the Doha Film Institute and video works from the collections of Mathaf, Arab Museum of Modern Art and the future Art Mill Museum Veniceartfactory

📍Location: ACP Palazzo Franchetti (I noble floor), S. Marco 2847

Dates: April 19th - November 24th, 2024

Open Wednesday to Monday (closed on Tuesdays), 10am-6pm

designboom's ultimate guide to the venice art biennale 2024

"Chasing The Dazzling Light" got the best first feature documentary at IDFA:

Members of the jury were greatly impressed "by the filmmaker's total command of the cinematic language, using very simple, even austere elements and a clever and insightful sense of humor to tell a complex story about exile, family loss, nostalgia, loneliness, and to do so in a self-reflective, dignified and moving way."

IDFA Festival | IDFA Award for Best Film goes to 1489 and Canuto's TransformationThe winners of IDFA's 36th edition competition programs were announced at the Awards Ceremony taking place at ITA (Internationaal Theater Amsterdam) on Thursday November 16. 1489 by Shoghakat Vardanyan won the IDFA Award for Best Film. Ariel Kuaray Ortega and Ernesto de Carvalho won the IDFA Award for Best Film in the Envision Competition for Canuto's Transformation.

"Chasing The Dazzling Light" The World Premiere at IDFA:

We are delighted to share with you that our new film, 'Chasing the Dazzling Light,' has been selected for its world premiere in the official competition of the Amsterdam International Documentary Film Festival IDFA, which will take place from November 8th to November 19th.

Chasing the Dazzling Light (2023) | IDFA FestivalDirector Yaser Kassab followed in his father’s footsteps by emigrating as a young man from Syria to Europe, and like his father he also had the ambition to become a filmmaker. Now they are working together on this film remotely. From Syria, the father gives his son direction on the phone or in video calls, along with advice about future film projects or how to organize his life—loving conversations interspersed with well-intentioned parental advice.This at times leads to amusing or uncomfortable scenes, while the film creates a beautiful portrait of a father in absence—a man who cannot be with his son, like so many Syrians who are separated from their offspring, whether by distance or death. Father and son live with a certain loneliness; for the refugee filmmaker, this arises from his attempts to build a new life with his wife within the confines of Sweden’s stricter new immigration laws. This is Kassab’s third film in a trilogy screened at IDFA, following On the Edge of Life and I Have Seen Nothing, I Have Seen All.

"Long Take" The World Premiere at Uppsala Short Film Festival:

We're delighted to share that our new film, “Long Take” has been selected for its world premiere in the national competition at the 42nd edition of the Uppsala Short Film Festival, which will take place between October 23rd and 29th.

Uppsala Kortfilmfestival | Short Film FestivalUppsala Kortfilmfestival äger rum 23-29 oktober 2023 på Reginateatern, Fyris och Slotts. Under sju dagar visas 300 kortfilmer från 70 länder.

"On the Edge of Life" Has a corner at an article about Intimate Exile:

World records Journal in their latest volume address the questions "How do generations engage in political struggle together, even as their horizons diverge?"

and they published several articles that reflect on the Syrian cinema.

Nicolas Appelt writes an article "Bidayyat \ Intimate Exile"

Bidayyat \ Intimate Exile - World Records

As part of the colloquium "Creations proof of exile of war"

at Université Sorbonne, Camille Leprince will present an analysis of the Syrian film On the edge of life by Yaser Kassab and Rima Alhamedd, the/ panel Genres, shapes, spaces from 11:45 to 1.15 p.m.

DOKUMENTÄRFOTOSALONG 2020: KAOS at Norrköping arbetarmuseum

Arbetets museumLåt dig beröras, uppröras och inspireras på Arbetets museum i Norrköping. Inte av föremål utan av minnen och berättelser. Arbetets museum i Norrköping är ett samtidsmuseum med historiskt djup. Museet öppnades 1991 och har sedan dess skildrat kvinnors och mäns arbete och vardagsliv. Museet har inga samlingar av föremål, istället samlar man på yrkesminnen och levnadsberättelser som gestaltas i utställningar och presenteras i skrifter. Arbetets museum har ett särskilt ansvar för Sveriges omkring 1500 arbetslivsmuseer. Ett arbetslivsmuseum är ett museum som berättar om en arbetsplats eller ett yrke, det kan till exempel vara ett sjukhus, en fabrik eller yrken som spinnerska, statare eller tvätterska. Arbetslivsmuseerna är som en karta över hur Sverige industrialiserades. Byggnaden som Arbetets museum bedriver sin verksamhet i kallas i folkmun Strykjärnet på grund av byggnadens form. Huset stod klart 1917 och användes inom textilindustrin fram till 1960-talet, då verksamheten lades ner. Det senaste från vår verksamhet hittar du på www.arbetetsmuseum.se och i våra sociala kanaler. Häng med oss där!

Photography exhebition at Oslo City Campaign, Berlin City Campaign

"I have seen Nothing I have seen Al" gains best short documentary at Sharjah film platform.

All the winners of Sharjah Film Platform awards: Syrian director Yaser Kassab among filmmakers honouredThe Sharjah Art Foundation also awarded UAE filmmaker Abdulla Al Kaabi $54,000 to produce his script

"I have seen Nothing I have seen Al" film review at Modern times

Lost outside timeIn Syria, not even once dead do you get peace. You may have thought that you had seen all. Instead, you had yet seen nothing.

"I have seen Nothing I have seen Al" film review at Alaraby UK

"لم أرَ شيئاً، رأيتُ كلّ شيء": حين تصبح المقابر السورية "كومبليه"في فيلمه الثاني، يروي السوري ياسر قصّاب تفاصيل العلاقة الصعبة بين منفيّ وبلده، عبر اشتغال بصريّ على واقع الموت السوري والمنافي القاتلة.

ON THE EDGE OF LIFE – Prix du jury at FAMILY FILM FESTIVAL

de Yasser Kassab (Syrie, 2017, documentaire, 44 minutes)

Rima and Yasser fled Syria. They are in Beirut, then somewhere in Turkey, as prisoners of an indefinite no man’s land. Yaser Kassab films his companion Rima, the soulless decor where they found refuge, the moon, the pupil full in an eye of black clouds. And everywhere resonate the words of loved ones left in Syria, the guilt of not being there to survive or die with them.

https://www.espace-1789.com/film/festival-du-film-de-famille-le-palmar%C3%A8s-0

"On the edge of life" as a Best documentary and Best mid-length documentary at Tirana Film Festival

Jury's motivation:

"A heart-rending personal essay on grief and uprooting, on the limbo states of existence"

"On the edge of life" best -mid-length documentary at Festival dei Popoli

jury's motivation:

"Both lyrical and personal, this film relates an urgent and all-too-common experience today employing a unique cinematic language which creates an important space for contemplation. A story of survival in a contemporary moment of uncertainty, the film gathers textures and images which attest to displacement and struggle but also their representation. Generous, open, subtle and filled with unsuspecting poetry, this film demonstrates how art, cinema and human connection are integral to existence in dire circumstances."

"On the edge of life" film review at Aljazera Documentary

سوريا.. على حافة الحياةمعظم الأعمال التسجيلية السورية لاتزال تحافظ على طزاجة موضوعية وفنيّة، ولم تسقط إلى اليوم في التكرار، وتصل إلى الجمهور مُغلفة بدماء المذابح وغبار المعارك وقساوة الواقع..

"On the edge of life" best first film at Cinema Du reel 2017
European Foundation Joris Ivens jury's motivation for the award as a best first film in the 39th edition of cinema du reel film festival.

Yaser Kassab transcend the process of mourning, developing a particular cinematic treatment of space, both internal and external.