10 Best Movies from Lebanon to Watch First

10 Essential Films from Lebanon

Ranked native cinema in Lebanon’s own creative voice.

1. 

   1. Capernaum

   کفرناحوم · 2018

   A hardened twelve-year-old boy scraping by on the streets of Beirut, jailed for a violent act, takes the astonishing step of suing his own parents for bringing him into a life of neglect and misery. Nadine Labaki's raw, heartbreaking drama.

2. 

   2. The Insult

   L'Insulte · 2017

   A trivial argument between a Lebanese Christian and a Palestinian refugee escalates into a lawsuit that grips the nation, exposing the country's old wounds and hidden grievances. A gripping, Oscar-nominated courtroom drama.

3. 

   3. Caramel

   سكر بنات · 2007

   In a Beirut beauty salon, five women share their loves, secrets, and small rebellions against tradition, from forbidden romance to the passage of time. Nadine Labaki's warm, sensual ensemble comedy-drama.

4. 

   4. West Beirut

   West Beyrouth · 1998

   As civil war erupts in 1975 Beirut, two mischievous teenage boys roam the divided city with their Super 8 camera, treating the chaos as an adventure even as the conflict closes in around their families. A vivid, bittersweet coming-of-age drama.

5. 

   5. Very Big Shot

   فيلم كتير كبير · 2015

   Three brothers running a small pizzeria as a front for drug dealing hatch an audacious plan to smuggle their product by hijacking a film production, and find themselves improbably becoming movie producers. A sharp Lebanese dark comedy about media and manipulation.

6. 

   6. 3000 Nights

   ٣٠٠٠ ليلة · 2015

   A young Palestinian woman wrongly imprisoned in an Israeli jail gives birth to a son behind bars and fights to raise and protect him amid the brutality of prison life. A harrowing drama based on true events.

7. 

   7. Costa Brava, Lebanon

   كوستا برافا · 2021

   A family that fled polluted, garbage-choked Beirut for an idyllic self-sufficient life in the mountains sees their utopia threatened when the government begins building a landfill right at their doorstep. A tender, timely drama.

8. 

   8. Memory Box

   2021

   When a box of teenage diaries, tapes, and photos arrives at their Montreal home, a Lebanese mother's secret past comes rushing back, and her curious daughter begins to unlock the story of her youth during the Beirut of the 1980s. A vibrant, layered drama.

9. 

   9. A Sad and Beautiful World

   نجوم الأمل و الألم · 2025

   Spanning three decades of passion, heartbreak, and hope, this sweeping romance follows two people magnetically drawn together and repeatedly forced to choose between their love and survival in a turbulent Lebanon. An epic love story.

10. 

    10. 1982

    2019

    On the day Israel invades Lebanon in 1982, an eleven-year-old boy at a mountain school works up the courage to confess his crush to a classmate, even as fear and rumor ripple through the campus. A tender, tense coming-of-age drama.