"Since it was first published in 1998, Viola Shafik's Arab Cinema: History and Cultural Identity has become an indispensable work for scholars of film and the contemporary Middle East. Combining detailed narrative history - economic, ideological, and aesthetic - with thought-provoking analysis, Arab Cinema provides a comprehensive overview of cinema in the Arab world, tracing the industry's development from colonial times to the present." "Now updated to reflect cultural shifts in the last ten years of cinema, this revised edition contains a postscript highlighting the latest developments in popular film and cinema d'auteur, with a special focus on Iraq, Lebanon, Syria, Tunisia, and Palestine."--BOOK JACKET.