Nelly Karim

Head of Jury

Nelly Karim is an Egyptian actress, fashion model and ballerina. Her debut in filmmaking was through Shabab Alla elhawa, which introduced Nelly with the Egyptian - Turkish film escape “The Runaway Mummy”, which was a turning point in her career. Then she starred in several successful films. In 2004, She won Best Actress award in the Cairo International Film Festival for her role in Enta Omry (My soulmate) and a Special Award at the Cairo National Festival for Egyptian Cinema in 2010 for her role in film One-Zero. A year later, she won the Jury Grand Prize at the Asia Pacific Screen Awards for her role in 678 followed by the Best Actress Prize for the same film at the Arab Film Festival in 2012. She was a jury member in both Cairo International Film Festival and Abu Dhabi Film Festival. Though other Egyptian artists have participated in the Venice International Film Festival's jury before, Nelly Karim was the first actress selected for this role in 2016. Most recently, she starred in Clash that premiered in Cannes' Un Certain Regard section and has been selected to represent Egypt at the 2017 Academy Awards in the Best Foreign Language Film category.

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