65th Venice International Film Festival in years, with some publications even describing it as the "worst ever". Later showings made It improve from bad to better, but it might have been too late. The 65th Venice International Film Festival will be dedicated to the late Egyptian director Youssef Chahine. Chahine who died recently at age 82, was a notable in post-war Arab cinema. Festival director Marco Mueller said, "Who else could have succeeded in mixing the philosopher Averroes with Fred Astaire? That's what cinema should be about", Mueller said, referring to Chahine's film "Destiny". Of the 52 films selected to screen at this year's Venice
Songs of Life Festival by Bulgaria. When trains came to take 49,000 more Bulgarian Jews to the death camps, the Bulgarian people resisted the demands of the German government and refused to allow their Jewish neighbors to be sent to concentration camps in what was the single largest non-deportation of Jews during World War II. The Songs of Life Festival debuted in November 2008 on the 65th anniversary of the rescue in the Bulgarian cities of Sofia and Plovdiv and in Petah Tikva and Jerusalem in Israel. Ernest Bloch’s choral-orchestral piece, "Sacred Service", a Jewish work, was performed. During the inaugural festival, 49,000 flowers