#After Lockdown: Very Short Stories about Enduring a Global Pandemic, a short film designed by NYC-based animation studio Mr Sebs and co-produced by Harvard University's Center for Middle Eastern Studies and Center for Hellenic Studies, has been selected to screen as part of the Big Apple Film Festival 2020 Fall Edition.
The 50-minute animated film, which premiered as part of Worldwide Week at Harvard 2020 and was submitted to the festival in a condensed version, presents individual stories about living through the 2020 Covid-19 pandemic in different places in the world. Students and professors, and contributors from outside the academic community, narrate their personal experiences with lockdown, travel restrictions, new forms of education, displacement, isolation, job loss, and more broadly, adapting their lives to the new circumstances imposed on them and on their communities.
The oral testimonials featured in the film were collected and selected jointly by Harvard University’s Tunisia Office of the Center for Middle Eastern Studies and Center for Hellenic Studies in Greece during the summer of 2020. Mr Sebs is co-directed by CMES AM alumnus Mohamad Saleh.
The Big Apple Film Festival is dedicated to showcasing and promoting the highest quality films from the New York City independent film community, as well as additional specially selected films from across the country and around the world. Each year BAFF presents awards in a variety of categories, including Best Feature Film, Short Film, Short Documentary, Feature Documentary, Animation, NYC Cityscape Award, Student Film Award, Golden Apple Award, and NY Emerging Talent Award.