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Varieties

France’s César Awards Honors Two Tunisians Women

Canadian-Tunisian Filmmaker Monia Chokri won the César Award for Best Foreign Film, for her feature ‘Simple comme Sylvain’. (AP)
Canadian-Tunisian Filmmaker Monia Chokri won the César Award for Best Foreign Film, for her feature ‘Simple comme Sylvain’. (AP)
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France’s César Awards Honors Two Tunisians Women

Canadian-Tunisian Filmmaker Monia Chokri won the César Award for Best Foreign Film, for her feature ‘Simple comme Sylvain’. (AP)
Canadian-Tunisian Filmmaker Monia Chokri won the César Award for Best Foreign Film, for her feature ‘Simple comme Sylvain’. (AP)

The prestigious Olympia of Paris hosted the 45th edition of the César Awards, which honors achievers in all the sectors of the French cinema, on Friday, February 24. Among tens of international celebrities, the accomplishments of two Arab women were celebrated at the highly-anticipated European event.

Kaouther Ben Hania won the Best Documentary Award for her documentary "Four Daughters" (Les Filles d’Olfa). The work was screened in several festivals and was nominated for the Oscars.

Born in Sidi Bouzid, in 1977, the Tunisian filmmaker studied at the School of Art and Cinema in Tunisia, has several documentaries, took part in a feature film writing workshop funded by Euromed, and collaborated with Al Jazeera Documentary. Kaouther Ben Hania took advantage of her Olympia appearance to raise her voice and angrily call for stopping the children killing in Gaza. “What’s happening there is so horrible. No one can say, ‘I didn’t know.’ This is the first massacre on live stream, live on our telephones,” she said in her speech.

Also, Quebecois-Tunisian Filmmaker Monia Chokri won the César Award for Best Foreign Film, for her feature ‘Simple comme Sylvain’. It tells the story of Sophie, a university professor who lived a peaceful life with her husband, Xavier, until she met Sylvain, the maintenance worker who came to restore their summer house.

Monia was born in Québec, in 1982, to two leftist parents. She studied acting at the Conservatoire d'art dramatique de Montréal. She played many roles in cinema and theater, before directing her first award-winning short film "An Extraordinary Person" in 2013. In 2019, she won the "Un Certain Regard Jury's Coup de Cœur Award" at the Cannes Film Festival.

This year, the participants at the César Awards raised their voice to denounce the silence in face of the sexual harassment that young actresses, filmmakers and producers have been subjected to in the industry. French director Justine Triet's "Anatomy of A Fall" won six trophies, including the Best Film Award at the César festival. The film has already received Cannes’ Palme D’Or last year and has been nominated for the forthcoming edition of the Oscars.

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Varieties

Forecasts Warn of Possible Winter Storms across US during Thanksgiving Week

A drone view shows a damaged area, following the passing of Hurricane Helene, in Asheville, North Carolina, US, September 29, 2024. (Reuters)
A drone view shows a damaged area, following the passing of Hurricane Helene, in Asheville, North Carolina, US, September 29, 2024. (Reuters)
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Forecasts Warn of Possible Winter Storms across US during Thanksgiving Week

A drone view shows a damaged area, following the passing of Hurricane Helene, in Asheville, North Carolina, US, September 29, 2024. (Reuters)
A drone view shows a damaged area, following the passing of Hurricane Helene, in Asheville, North Carolina, US, September 29, 2024. (Reuters)

Forecasters through the US issued warnings that another round of winter weather could complicate travel leading up to the Thanksgiving holiday, while California and Washington state continue to recover from storm damage and power outages.
In California, where a person was found dead in a vehicle submerged in floodwaters on Saturday, authorities braced for more precipitation while grappling with flooding and small landslides from a previous storm. Thousands in the Pacific Northwest remained without power after multiple days in the dark.
The National Weather Service office in Sacramento, California, issued a winter storm warning for the state's Sierra Nevada for Saturday through Tuesday, with heavy snow expected at higher elevations and wind gusts potentially reaching 55 mph (88 kph). Total snowfall of roughly 4 feet (1.2 meters) was forecast, with the heaviest accumulations expected Monday and Tuesday.
The Midwest and Great Lakes regions will see rain and snow Monday and the East Coast will be the most impacted on Thanksgiving and Black Friday, forecasters said.
A low pressure system is forecast to bring rain to the Southeast early Thursday before heading to the Northeast. Areas from Boston to New York could see rain and strong winds, with snowfall possible in parts of northern New Hampshire, northern Maine and the Adirondacks. If the system tracks further inland, there could be less snow and more rain in the mountains, forecasters said.
Deadly 'bomb cyclone’ on West Coast Earlier this week, two people died when the storm arrived in the Pacific Northwest. Hundreds of thousands lost power, mostly in the Seattle area, before strong winds moved through Northern California. A rapidly intensifying “ bomb cyclone ” that hit the West Coast on Tuesday brought fierce winds that resulted in home and vehicle damage.
Rescue crews in Guerneville, California, recovered a body inside a vehicle bobbing in floodwaters around 11:30 a.m. Saturday, Sonoma County Sheriff’s Deputy Rob Dillion said, noting the deceased was presumed to be a victim of the storm but an autopsy had not yet been conducted.
Santa Rosa, California, saw its wettest three-day period on record with about 12.5 inches (32 centimeters) of rain by Friday evening, the National Weather Service in the Bay Area reported. Vineyards in nearby Windsor, California, were flooded on Saturday.
Tens of thousands without power in Seattle area Some 80,000 people in the Seattle area were still without electricity after this season’s strongest atmospheric river, a long plume of moisture that forms over an ocean and flows over land.
The power came back in the afternoon at Katie Skipper’s home in North Bend, about 30 miles (50 kilometers) east of Seattle, after being out since Tuesday. She was tired from taking cold showers, warming herself with a wood stove and using a generator to run the refrigerator, but Skipper said those inconveniences paled in comparison to the damage other people suffered, such as from fallen trees.
“That’s really sad and scary,” she said.
Northeast gets needed precipitation Another storm brought rain to New York and New Jersey, where rare wildfires have raged in recent weeks, and heavy snow to northeastern Pennsylvania. The precipitation was expected to help ease drought conditions after an exceptionally dry fall.
“It’s not going to be a drought buster, but it’s definitely going to help when all this melts,” said Bryan Greenblatt, a National Weather Service meteorologist in Binghamton, New York.
Heavy snow fell in northeastern Pennsylvania, including the Pocono Mountains. Higher elevations reported up to 17 inches (43 centimeters), with lesser accumulations in valley cities including Scranton and Wilkes-Barre. Less than 80,000 customers in 10 counties lost power.
Precipitation in West Virginia helped put a dent in the state’s worst drought in at least two decades and boosted ski resorts preparing to open their slopes in the weeks ahead.