Samer NAJARI (1976, Russia) was born in Moscow to a Syrian father and a Lebanese mother. He began his studies in architecture at the Uni­versity of Damascus at the age of 18. Since immigrating to Canada in 1994, he has completed a BFA in Film Production at Concordia Uni­versity. In 2001 he took part in a two-year residency at the Le Fresnoy - Studio National des Arts Contemporains in France. Since his return to Canada, Samer Najari has directed two internationally acclaimed short films. Arwad is his first fea­ture-length film and is co-directed by Dominique Chila.