Jackie Chan, Spike Lee Head To Saudi Arabia’s Red Sea Film Fest – Deadline 

Saudi Arabia’s Red Sea International Film Festival has unveiled a star-studded In-Conversations program as the second edition gets underway in the port city of Jeddah today.

Confirmed guest speakers include Oscar winners Spike Lee and Jackie Chan, Oscar-nominees Andy Garcia and Luca Guadagnino as well as actors Akshay Kumar, Nelly Karim, Ranbir Kapoor, and Hrithik Roshan and actress-director Nadine Labaki.

A raft of top directors will also be talking about their careers including Guy Ritchie, Gurinder Chadha, Andrew Dominik, Fatih Akin, Adil El Arbi & Bilall Fallah, Kaouther Ben Hania, Michel Ocelot, and Gaspar Noé.

“Our schedule of In-Conversations taking place at this year’s Festival brings together some of the leading voices in international, Bollywood and Arab cinema, sharing their journeys to the big screen and the wisdom that they have learned along the way,” said Red Sea Film Festival CEO Mohammed Al Turki.

“We are thrilled to be able to further share their voices with Saudi audiences, and honour this truly eclectic group with our powerful series of intimate, in-depth conversations.”

Running December 1-10, the second edition of the Red Sea Film Festival opens this evening with a gala screening for Shekhar Kapur’s cross-cultural romantic comedy What’s Love Got to Do With It? starring Lily James who is also due to attend.

The freshly announced In-Conversation program joins a selection of 131 feature films and shorts hailing from 61 countries, encompassing international festival hits such as Hirokazu Kore-eda’s Broker, Martin McDonagh’s The Banshees of Inisherin, Park Chan-wook’s Decision to Leave, Sam Mendes’ Empire of Light as well as local and regional pictures.