Labaki for Lebanese poor kids

MNA Entertainment Desk: Lebanese filmmaker Nadine Labaki, who won one of the top prizes at Cannes on Saturday with a story of dirt poor children and migrants, dedicated her award to her impoverished amateur cast and her homeland.

Labaki is the first Arab woman to have won a major prize at the festival and only the second to have had a film competing for the Palme d’Or.

Her stirring film “Capernaum”, whose 13-year-old Syrian refugee lead captured hearts in Cannes, had been tipped to win the Palme in a bumper years for films from North Africa and the Middle East.

Accepting the third-placed Jury Prize, Labaki said her thoughts were with a 12-year-old cast member, who she discovered selling tissues on the street, and who had probably again spent the day with “her face pressed against car windows”.

“I really think about them (the cast). I hope the film will enable the voices of these children to be better heard and trigger a debate,” she told reporters.

The glamorous 44-year-old added that she was “almost ashamed to be wearing such beautiful dresses” to promote her film about a boy who takes his parents to court for bringing him into a miserable, loveless existence.