OPENS JAN. 8

This series of recent films covers more territory than Abe himself ever did, including movies from the West Bank, Tunisia, Iraq, and beyond. Perhaps the widest-ranging one was shot entirely in a New York apartment: Edward Said—The Last Interview (at 2:30 p.m. Saturday, Jan. 8) begins with the noted anti-Orientalist, then dying of leukemia, protesting that he has little energy. The Jerusalem-born scholar and activist then proceeds to articulately discuss his life and work, literature and music, American imperialism, and the Palestinian condition. The last subject is also illustrated in a pair of 2002 films by Palestinian director Hany Abu-Assad, Rana’s Wedding and Ford Transit (both at 4 p.m. Sunday, Jan. 16). The first is a romantic dramedy about a young woman who has only a few hours to meet her father’s deadline to either marry or leave Jerusalem; the second is a wry, revealing documentary that follows a Palestinian cabbie who drives a former Israeli police van to (but rarely through) Israeli checkpoints. The other films are Earth and Ashes (pictured; at 4 p.m. Sunday, Jan. 9), in which an Afghan man and his young grandson search for the boy’s father; Turn Left at the End of the World (at 2:30 p.m. Saturday, Jan. 15), which observes the tentative friendship between Indian and Moroccan neighbors in Israel; and The Bookstore (at 4:30 p.m. Sunday, Jan. 30), set in a Tunisian shop owned by a family in turmoil. The series opens Saturday, Jan. 8, and runs through Sunday, Jan. 30 (see Showtimes for a complete schedule), at the National Gallery of Art’s East Building Auditorium, 4th Street and Constitution Ave. NW. Free. (202) 842-6799. (Mark Jenkins)