New York, March 11, 2021 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- New York Film Academy (NYFA) is excited to share that MFA Filmmaking alum Meital Cohen Navarro will be screening her NYFA thesis film, Over My Dead Body, at the world-class San Luis Obispo International Festival (SLO Film Fest). The film will be competing in the Drama Shorts category and will be available to watch online through March 14, 2021.
Over My Dead Body is written, directed, and produced by Israeli-born female filmmaker and NYFA alum Meital Cohen Navarro. Her short film explores the taboo of religious intolerance and inter-cultural marriage after a young Jewish Persian-American woman named Isfahan tells her parents that her fiancé is Muslim.
Over My Dead Body had its world premiere at the prestigious UK Jewish Film Festival in London last November and its North American Premiere at the Atlanta Jewish Film Festival. Ahead of the film’s West Coast premiere at SLO Film Fest, Cohen Navarro received critical acclaim for Over My Dead Body from Voice of America, National Magazine Kayhan London, and the Jewish Journal.
“As a grandchild of immigrants, making this film was an amazing journey,” recalls Cohen Navarro. “I hope the film helps families with intergenerational rifts to better understand each other: For parents to see the toll it has on their children and for the younger generation to acknowledge their parents’ equally heartbreaking cultural challenges.”
Shot in English and Farsi, Over My Dead Body features Muslim, Christian, and Jewish actors and iconic stars of Persian cinema Mary Apick (Dead End) and Bahram Vatanparast (Zan-e bakere) in leading roles.
"I believe our role as filmmakers is to project a view of our daily lives onto the silver screen with such sincerity and honesty as possible,” shares Apick. "Each character must face all challenges and obstacles that we all face every day in today's world. Meital Cohen Navarro has certainly accomplished that delicately and beautifully in the film Over My Dead Body."
During the film’s screening at SLO Film Fest, Cohen Navarro will also have a special live Q&A about the film with NYFA’s own Director of the NYFA Film Festival Department, Crickett Rumley, on Thursday, March 11, 2021, at 7:00 p.m. PT. The Q&A will also feature the Director of Photography for the film (NYFA alum Brad Hamilton) and the Over My Dead Body cast.
“Meital does an undeniably brilliant job of exploring the complex perspectives of a family steeped in religious and cultural traditions that they are committed to preserving,” says Rumley. “From the parents’ first awkward meeting of their daughter’s fiancé to the explosive, thought-provoking climax, anyone who has ever struggled against tradition will relate to these characters and their struggle.”
New York Film Academy congratulates the incredible recognition of alum Meital Cohen Navarro on her latest short film Over My Dead Body. For more information on the Q&A with Cohen Navarro and to purchase tickets to view her film during the festival, click here.
About New York Film Academy
New York Film Academy (NYFA) is a leading film, media, and performing arts college that offers hands-on intensive undergraduate and graduate degree programs, certificates, and workshops across a multitude of areas of study in New York City, Los Angeles, South Beach/Miami, Gold Coast (Australia), Florence (Italy), Beijing and Shanghai (China), and more. Its programs are accelerated and NYFA students can complete a four-year BFA degree in three years. NYFA’s online program offerings allow students the opportunity to advance their creative and technical skills in NYFA’s “Hands-Online Workshops,” available across NYFA’s visual, media, and performing arts disciplines.
NYFA is regionally accredited by the WASC Senior College and University Commission (WSCUC), and is an accredited institutional member of the National Association of Schools of Art and Design (NASAD). These accreditations extend to all NYFA campuses in the United States and overseas.
For more information, please visit nyfa.edu.
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