Freida Pinto to appear in film on Israeli-Palestanian women

Jerusalem, Mar 25 : After a dream debut performance in Oscar-winning" Slumdog Millionaire", Indian actress Freida Pinto is in Israel to shoot for a new film that focuses on the interwoven lives of a Israeli and Palestinian women from the early years of the state through the early 1990s.

The film,"Miral" by eminent American filmmaker Julian Schnabel, will be filmed entirely here and the shooting is scheduled to start next month immediately after the Passover holidays. The screenplay has been adopted by Schnabel, of"The Diving Bell and the Butterfly" fame, from a book by Palestinian-Italian writer Rula Jebreal who is said to have helped finalise the script.

Pinto, 24, will be sharing the screen with female lead Hiam Abbass (" Lemon Tree"), a Palestinian actress who lives in France. The film's Israeli producer, Eran Riklis, said that the casting for the film has not yet been completed.