Ghassan Salhab’s debut feature Phantom Beirut (Ashbah Beyrouth) is steeped in ghosts - both literal and metaphorical.
Set in the late 1980s - whilst Lebanon’s Civil War limps to a close - it follows Khalil, a man who faked his own death ten years earlier. Now returning to Beirut under a new identity he’s forced to confront the people, and past, he abandoned.
Blurring the lines between fiction and reality, Salhab weaves documentary elements through the narrative, adding an unsettling layer of truth. This deeply atmospheric film explores the silence and collective amnesia that war leaves in its wake—where stories are rewritten, identities reshaped, and the weight of history is inescapable.
