Rosie Malek – News Release

rosiemalek-yonan_rendition.jpgLOS ANGELES, 22 October 2007 – Rosie Malek-Yonan’s latest role in New Line Cinema’s Rendition is opposite Reese Witherspoon as an Egyptian mother, Nuru El-Ibrahimi, whose son, played by Omar Matwaly, is kidnapped by the CIA in Oscar winning director, Gavin Hood’s politically charged thriller that sweeps through the world of terrorism and torture.

Malek-Yonan is an Assyrian activist and author, intimately familiar with her nation’s struggle as minority Christians in the Middle-East. With the publication of her book, The Crimson Field [http://www.thecirmsonfield.com] in 2005, Malek-Yonan brought the Assyrian Genocide to the limelight. While Armenians are awaiting the next step by the U.S. House of Representatives to recognize the Genocide, Malek-Yonan strives to set the record straight that the Assyrians and Greeks were also a part of the Genocide by the Ottoman Turks during WWI, wherein the Assyrians lost two-thirds of their population.

Due to her expertise on the ongoing Assyrian Genocide, as evident from her book, The Crimson Field, on the suggestion of famed Oscar winning director, Terrence Malick, in 2006 Malek-Yonan testified on Capitol Hill about the plight of the Assyrian Christians in Iraq.

Rendition premiered at the Toronto International Film Festival in early September 2007 and is now in theatres worldwide. The film also stars Jake Gyllenhaal, Meryl Streep, Peter Sarsgaard, and Alan Arkin. Film Critic, Roger Ebert, gave the film four out of four stars, saying that, “Rendition is valuable and rare. It is a movie about the theory and practice of two things: torture and personal responsibility. And it is wise about what is right, and what is wrong.”

Media Contact for Rosie Malek-Yonan
Trip Miller
The Trip Miller Company
tripmiller@sbcglobal.net