POTSDAM -- Cinema 10 continues its Fall 2026 season tonight, Nov. 2, with a screening of The President's Cake/Mamlaket al-qasab, a 2025 film from Iraq, Qater, and the United States, directed by Hasan Hadi. 

Set during the Gulf War, The President’s Cake follows a 9-year-old girl who is selected to bake a cake for Saddam Hussein’s birthday. She sets out on a journey to find all the necessary ingredients… or face a stiff punishment. Filmed mostly in Iraq with untrained actors, the film is the directorial debut of Hasan Hadi, who received the Camera d’Or at the 2025 Cannes Film Festival. Writing for The Globe and Mail, Barry Hertz said, “the film blends a striking sense of street-level realism, political commentary and poetic nostalgia for the naive innocence of youth.”  

The film is in Arabic, is 105 minutes long and is rated PG-13 for strong language, some suggestive material and smoking.

Films are shown on Monday evenings at 7:15 pm in the Roxy Theater in Potsdam.  Tickets are $6.50 general/$55 sharable season or $5.50 student/senior / $45 sharable season (special prices for The Rocky Horror Picture Show.)  For more information visit www.cinema10.org.

The fall 2026 Cinema 10 season is made possible with funds from the Statewide Community Regrants Program, a regrant program of the New York State Council on the Arts, with the support of the Office of the Governor and the New York State Legislature, and administered by the St. Lawrence County Arts Council.