Tribeca Festival: A$AP Rocky, Emily Ratajkowski and Vanessa Hudgens among stars to attend premieres


Sophie Prideaux
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The Tribeca Festival is underway in New York, marking the US's first in-person film festival since the start of the pandemic.

Now in its 20th year, the event has dropped "film" from its title, as the event also features shorts, TV series, podcasts and games.

This year, the Features programme will include 66 productions from 81 filmmakers from 23 countries, as well as 56 world premieres. The event kicked off on Wednesday with the premiere of Jon M Chu's adaptation of Lin-Manuel Miranda's musical In the Heights.

Over the weekend, a number of premieres took place, including A$AP Rocky documentary Stockholm Syndrome. The film follows the rapper's rise to fame, and details the dark turn his story took when he was imprisoned following a violent altercation in Stockholm, Sweden, during the European leg of his 2019 tour. Rocky, real name Rakim Mayers, was present at the documentary's premiere, alongside co-producers Matthew Perniciaro and Michael Sherman.

Also enjoying its premiere at the festival was Oklahoma-made thriller, Asking For It, which stars Vanessa Hudgens, Ezra Miller and Luke Hemsworth. Hudgens attended the film's presentation, dressed in a leopard print shirt dress, which she teamed with a slick bun up-do.

With/In, a documentary-style film starring Julianne Moore, Don Cheadle, Rebecca Hall and more, was shot on iPhone and tasked people to shoot a short film dealing with quarantine life in 2020. Sanaa Lathan and Chris Cooper make their directorial debuts with With/In as Bart Freundlich helms the project. The result is a touchingly optimistic record of one of this generation's most difficult years.

Tommy Thayer, Paul Stanley, Gene Simmons and Eric Singer of Kiss were also in attendance for the premiere of their documentary, Biography: KISStory. 

The celebrate, the band also put on a mini concert at the Festival's Battery Park location, with performances of Detroit Rock City, Shout It Out LoudWar Machine and Heaven's on Fire. It was the band's first live performance in more than a year.

While there was initial worry that submissions for this year's Tribeca would be on the lower side because of the pandemic, festival director Cara Cusumano said it’s had an opposite effect.

"We didn't know what to expect, submissions wise," she told Variety magazine. "I had heard from colleagues that festivals had been seeing fewer submissions this year, which makes sense, but our submissions actually did go up. We had over 10,000 in total, across all of our sections."

Dhadak

Director: Shashank Khaitan

Starring: Janhvi Kapoor, Ishaan Khattar, Ashutosh Rana

Stars: 3

The Voice of Hind Rajab

Starring: Saja Kilani, Clara Khoury, Motaz Malhees

Director: Kaouther Ben Hania

Rating: 4/5

UAE currency: the story behind the money in your pockets
Green ambitions
  • Trees: 1,500 to be planted, replacing 300 felled ones, with veteran oaks protected
  • Lake: Brown's centrepiece to be cleaned of silt that makes it as shallow as 2.5cm
  • Biodiversity: Bat cave to be added and habitats designed for kingfishers and little grebes
  • Flood risk: Longer grass, deeper lake, restored ponds and absorbent paths all meant to siphon off water 
GRAN%20TURISMO
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Key facilities
  • Olympic-size swimming pool with a split bulkhead for multi-use configurations, including water polo and 50m/25m training lanes
  • Premier League-standard football pitch
  • 400m Olympic running track
  • NBA-spec basketball court with auditorium
  • 600-seat auditorium
  • Spaces for historical and cultural exploration
  • An elevated football field that doubles as a helipad
  • Specialist robotics and science laboratories
  • AR and VR-enabled learning centres
  • Disruption Lab and Research Centre for developing entrepreneurial skills
The years Ramadan fell in May

1987

1954

1921

1888

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The Bio

Hometown: Bogota, Colombia
Favourite place to relax in UAE: the desert around Al Mleiha in Sharjah or the eastern mangroves in Abu Dhabi
The one book everyone should read: 100 Years of Solitude by Gabriel Garcia Marquez. It will make your mind fly
Favourite documentary: Chasing Coral by Jeff Orlowski. It's a good reality check about one of the most valued ecosystems for humanity

UAE currency: the story behind the money in your pockets

Day 1 results:

Open Men (bonus points in brackets)
New Zealand 125 (1) beat UAE 111 (3)
India 111 (4) beat Singapore 75 (0)
South Africa 66 (2) beat Sri Lanka 57 (2)
Australia 126 (4) beat Malaysia -16 (0)

Open Women
New Zealand 64 (2) beat South Africa 57 (2)
England 69 (3) beat UAE 63 (1)
Australia 124 (4) beat UAE 23 (0)
New Zealand 74 (2) beat England 55 (2)

Lexus LX700h specs

Engine: 3.4-litre twin-turbo V6 plus supplementary electric motor

Power: 464hp at 5,200rpm

Torque: 790Nm from 2,000-3,600rpm

Transmission: 10-speed auto

Fuel consumption: 11.7L/100km

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The burning issue

The internal combustion engine is facing a watershed moment – major manufacturer Volvo is to stop producing petroleum-powered vehicles by 2021 and countries in Europe, including the UK, have vowed to ban their sale before 2040. The National takes a look at the story of one of the most successful technologies of the last 100 years and how it has impacted life in the UAE.

Read part three: the age of the electric vehicle begins

Read part two: how climate change drove the race for an alternative 

Read part one: how cars came to the UAE

While you're here
The years Ramadan fell in May

1987

1954

1921

1888

More from Armen Sarkissian
UAE currency: the story behind the money in your pockets

Torbal Rayeh Wa Jayeh
Starring: Ali El Ghoureir, Khalil El Roumeithy, Mostafa Abo Seria
Stars: 3

The specs

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Transmission: 7-speed auto

0-100kmh 2.3 seconds

0-200kmh 5.5 seconds

0-300kmh 11.6 seconds

Power: 1500hp

Torque: 1600Nm

Price: Dh13,400,000

On sale: now

UAE currency: the story behind the money in your pockets
Match info:

Real Betis v Sevilla, 10.45pm (UAE)

Specs

Engine: Duel electric motors
Power: 659hp
Torque: 1075Nm
On sale: Available for pre-order now
Price: On request

The five pillars of Islam

1. Fasting

2. Prayer

3. Hajj

4. Shahada

5. Zakat 

Evacuations to France hit by controversy
  • Over 500 Gazans have been evacuated to France since November 2023
  • Evacuations were paused after a student already in France posted anti-Semitic content and was subsequently expelled to Qatar
  • The Foreign Ministry launched a review to determine how authorities failed to detect the posts before her entry
  • Artists and researchers fall under a programme called Pause that began in 2017
  • It has benefited more than 700 people from 44 countries, including Syria, Turkey, Iran, and Sudan
  • Since the start of the Gaza war, it has also included 45 Gazan beneficiaries
  • Unlike students, they are allowed to bring their families to France
Key findings of Jenkins report
  • Founder of the Muslim Brotherhood, Hassan al Banna, "accepted the political utility of violence"
  • Views of key Muslim Brotherhood ideologue, Sayyid Qutb, have “consistently been understood” as permitting “the use of extreme violence in the pursuit of the perfect Islamic society” and “never been institutionally disowned” by the movement.
  • Muslim Brotherhood at all levels has repeatedly defended Hamas attacks against Israel, including the use of suicide bombers and the killing of civilians.
  • Laying out the report in the House of Commons, David Cameron told MPs: "The main findings of the review support the conclusion that membership of, association with, or influence by the Muslim Brotherhood should be considered as a possible indicator of extremism."
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Farage on Muslim Brotherhood

Nigel Farage told Reform's annual conference that the party will proscribe the Muslim Brotherhood if he becomes Prime Minister.
"We will stop dangerous organisations with links to terrorism operating in our country," he said. "Quite why we've been so gutless about this – both Labour and Conservative – I don't know.
“All across the Middle East, countries have banned and proscribed the Muslim Brotherhood as a dangerous organisation. We will do the very same.”
It is 10 years since a ground-breaking report into the Muslim Brotherhood by Sir John Jenkins.
Among the former diplomat's findings was an assessment that “the use of extreme violence in the pursuit of the perfect Islamic society” has “never been institutionally disowned” by the movement.
The prime minister at the time, David Cameron, who commissioned the report, said membership or association with the Muslim Brotherhood was a "possible indicator of extremism" but it would not be banned.

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Scorline

Iraq 1-0 UAE

Iraq Hussein 28’

Porsche Taycan Turbo specs

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Transmission: two-speed

Power: 671hp

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The five pillars of Islam