Sunday Screening – Live From Bethlehem

Emerging from the ashes of the second Intifada, the Bethlehem-based agency is an increasingly prominent and influential journalistic force in the wider Middle East. The film chronicles the agency’s struggles and successes through the eyes of the station’s reporters, producers, and photographers, and reveals the humanity of ordinary Palestinians as they go about their daily lives.

Focusing on people rather than issues, the documentary never loses sight of the social and political forces that Ma’an journalists have to negotiate as they go about their work. The result is a portrait of life and newsgathering in one of the world’s most troubled regions.

Filmmakers: Matt Sienkiewicz and Joseph C. Sousa
Duration: 36 min
Year: 2009e

Film website here

Matt Sienkiewicz is an Emmy-nominated screenwriter and documentarian, as well as a PhD candidate at the University of Wisconsin. His academic research focuses on Western involvement in Middle Eastern broadcasting initiatives and ethnic representation in American media. His work has been published inThe Journal of Film and Video and Sage Publications’Understanding Community Media.