Founded in 1917, The Shabandar Café in Al Mutanabi Street in the heart of the old centre of Baghdad, was a cultural landmark, where generations of Iraqis came to discuss and debate literature and politics - a living repository of Irqi intellectual history and one of the last places where people could gather to exchange ideas. Emad had shot most of his film by the end of 2006, but in March 2007, a massive car bomb destroyed the Shabandar Café, all the bookshops on Mutanabi Street, and killed and wounded scores of people. Days later, Baghdad's poets and artists held a wake in the ruins of the street they loved so much and Emad took a small camera and went back to film. As he was leaving he was attacked, his camera stolen and he was shot in the legs and chest, and his own story is an epilogue to his film about the Shabandar Café and Mutanabi Street - Before and after they were destroyed.

Iraq, 2007 / Emad Alifrom Independent Film & Television College, Baghdad
23 mins