Are you looking for something to do on Friday evenings? CineCulture offers free screenings of independent films nearly every Friday during the school year to Fresno State campus students, faculty and staff and the broader community. The movies are followed by a discussion with someone involved in the film or an expert on the subject.

All films screened on campus are free and open to the public. Parking is not enforced after 4 p.m. on Fridays.

"The Cave" (2019)
When: 5:30 p.m. Friday, Jan. 31.
Where: Peters Education Center Auditorium (west of the Save Mart Center in the Student Recreation Center building)

Discussant: Dr. Ahmad Tarakji (President of Syrian American Medical Society/SAMS) and producer Kirstine Barfod.

Feras Fayyad, the first Syrian director nominated for an Oscar for his documentary "Last Men in Aleppo" (2017), delivers an unflinching story of the Syrian war with his powerful new documentary. For besieged civilians, hope and safety lie underground inside the subterranean hospital known as the "Cave," where pediatrician and managing physician Dr. Amani Ballour and her colleagues Samaher and Dr. Alaa have claimed their right to work as equals alongside their male counterparts, doing their jobs in a way that would be unthinkable in the oppressively patriarchal culture that exists above. Following the women as they contend with daily bombardments, chronic shortages of supplies and the ever-present threat of chemical attacks, "The Cave" paints a stirring portrait of courage, resilience and female solidarity. The hospital featured in the film is sponsored by the Syrian American Medical Society or SAMS.

Sponsor: Syrian American Medical Society

Coming next — "Balzac and the Little Chinese Seamstress" (2002)

Chinese-French author, screenwriter and filmmaker Dai Sijie directed this feature film based on his own semi-autobiographical novel set in the early 1970s during the later stages of China’s Cultural Revolution. It tells the story of two young men, university students, who are sent to a remote mountain village in southwest China for three years of Communist re-education to purge them of their decadent Western education. Amid the back-breaking work and stifling ignorance of the community, they fall in love with a local beauty, the daughter of the most renowned tailor in the region. When they discover a hidden suitcase filled with banned books by western writers, they read these works to the little seamstress for hours on end in a secret meeting place. Thirsting for knowledge of the world beyond, she is mesmerized by the novels of 19th century French writer Honoré de Balzac and eventually falls in love with the two young men who read this author’s stories to her. On her mystical journey, the Little Seamstress finds the courage to leave her village for broader horizons.

For a complete schedule, visit the College of Arts and Humanities blog.