Actualités

Although Iran continues to hold the sceptres in the region as its largest movie industry, the cinema of other countries from the region finds an increasing numbers of way out, with Kazakhstan’s genre movies for example. At the same time, festivals all around the world continue to nurture movies from the region, whose approach is definitely of independent style, but not exactly arthouse, at least not all the time. “Songs of Adam” and “Seed of the Sacred Fig” definitely stood out this year due to their quality, just like “Sima’s Song” and “From Ground Zero” did for their significance

Without further ado, here are the best West-Central Asian (rest of Asia one could say) films of 2024, in random order. Some films may have premiered in 2023, but since they mostly circulated in 2024, we decided to include them.

15. Dastur

One of the reasons “Dastur” fared so well at the domestic...

Christoph Thoke’s Mogador Film, Sebastian Popp’s Stoked Film (both Germany) and Jeremy Chua’s Potocol (Singapore) have joined forces to back “The Clouds Woke No Clocks,” a refugee drama from Indian filmmaker Aniket Dutta. The project will be led by Indian producer Roshni Sen and Dutta’s Empty Video banner.

Acclaimed Bangladesh actors Mostafa Monwar and Deepanwita Martin (Busan title “No Ground Beneath the Feet”) are set to star in the film, which follows a displaced family settling in a makeshift camp in the Himalayan foothills. The story centers on parents Khalid and Sharmeen, and their eight-year-old son Shoaib, who relocate to India to escape persecution in their home country.

“For me the state of being is more important than the state of being a refugee,” says Dutta, whose debut feature “Ghost of the Golden Groves,” co-directed with Sen, played at Festival du Nouveau Cinema Montreal. “I’m...

Paparazzo — a script by Christian Nilsson that landed on the 2024 Black List of the year’s best unproduced screenplays — has landed at White Noise producer Passage Pictures, run by Uri Singer.

Set in the world of tabloid journalism, the Paparazzo follows an opportunistic outcast who needs fast cash to help his ailing mother and decides to partner with a wily paparazzo. But the pursuit for photos entangles the two in a homicide involving young celebutantes.

Nilsson, who recently completed the feature film Westhampton, said “I’ve always been fascinated by outsiders—people who hover on the edge of society, who do the things most of us don’t want to admit we need. This film is a love letter to that contradiction. It’s as much about the chase for truth as it is about the damage left in its wake. Uri immediately understood what this story could be, and...

“Home” is the theme of the 4th edition of the Red Sea Film Festival as it returns to its original location, but in a sleek custom-built venue, in the recently renovated Al-Balad district in Jeddah, a Unesco World Heritage site.

Kaleem Aftab, the fest’s head of international programming, says that home is a fitting theme for this year’s edition since the festival increasingly serves as a key platform for Africa, Arab and Asian cinema, and its impact is now all-year-round through the work of the Red Sea Film Foundation.

“We’re focusing on what we can achieve as a foundation rather than just as a festival,” he explains, adding that 11 of the 122 films screening at this year’s edition have been developed within the Red Sea eco-system, including the opening film, “The Tale of Daye’s Family,” which is a Saudi Egyptian co-production.

“We are the best place...

The Red Sea International Film Festival is now a Spike Lee joint.

The Oscar-winning filmmaker will preside over the Jeddah, Saudi Arabia film festival’s features-competition jury this year, Red Sea announced on Thursday via Instagram. Lee’s impressive filmography includes “Do the Right Thing” (1989), “Malcolm X” (1992), and “BlacKkKlansman” (2019), for which he won the Best Adapted Screenplay Oscar. “BlacKkKlansman” was also nominated for Lee’s directing and for Best Picture.

The 2024 Red Sea Film Festival will take place in Jeddah’s Old Town of Al Balad from December 5-14.

Not in competition but newly announced to play at Red Sea 2024 is Thierry Frémaux’s “Lumière: Le Cinema,” the sequel to “Lumière: The Adventure Begins,” which debuted at the inaugural Red Sea festival. “Le Cinema” is a cinephile’s dream, described as “an unparalleled journey through the early days of celluloid,” it features 100 newly restored films. Frémaux is the director of...

“Saba” is a powerful movie about life, duty, and how strong people are against the busy and complicated landscape of Dhaka, Bangladesh. The movie, directed by Maksud Hossain for the first time, is about Saba, a 25-year-old woman who is taking care of her paralyzed mother, Shirin while living an unbelievably hard life.

The story is mostly about Saba’s desperate efforts to get money for her mom’s heart surgery, which will save her life. She faces societal judgments and personal sacrifices while working at a seedy hookah bar, which reflects the struggles of Bangladesh’s young people who are on the outside. Her life is too stifling; her tiny apartment is both a safe place for her and a jail since she has to lock her mother inside while she works.

The first book by Hossain is not just a personal story; it’s also a complex political...

Viola Davis will be honored by Saudi Arabia’s Red Sea Film Festival, where the Oscar winner and four-time nominee will also be holding a master class highlighting her career.

On Monday, the festival — which will run Dec. 6 to 14 in Jeddah, on the Red Sea’s eastern shore — announced the main lineup of its fourth edition, which will open with the world premiere of Egyptian director Karim Shenawy’s musical drama “The Tale of Daye’s Family.” The film follows an 11-year-old Nubian albino with a beautiful voice “who faces adversity due to his unique appearance,” as the provided synopsis puts it.

“For us, this a perfect representation of where this region is headed and what’s happening here,” said the fest’s managing director Shivani Pandya Malhotra at a press conference, noting that the inspirational film is a co-production between Egypt and Saudi.

The Red Sea fest – which is...

The fourth editon of Saudi Arabia’s Red Sea International Film Festival (December 5-14) has unveiled the line-up for its Competition strand and has selected Egypt-Saudi co-productionThe Tale Of Daye’s Family as its opening film.

The Tale Of Daye’s Family by Egyptian filmmaker Karim Shenawi tells the story of an 11-year-old Nubian albino boy who faces adversity due to his unique appearance and who gets a chance to audition for an Egyptian version of talent show The Voice.

Scroll down for full Competition line-up

Speaking at a Red Sea press conference this morning, the festival’s managing director...

A sense of financial and personal stagnation permeates “Saba,” the Bangladeshi social drama from first-time director Maksud Hossain. A strong (if stylistically straightforward) debut, it follows 25-year-old Saba (Mehazabien Chowdhury), who struggles to make ends meet while looking after her ailing, paraplegic single mother Shirin (Rokeya Prachy), whose own frustrations often explode in Saba’s direction.

To pay for Shirin’s life-saving surgery, Saba finds a waitressing job at a seedy hookah lounge in Dhaka — a position in which, she’s told, women tend not to last — with long hours that only complicate her caregiving duties. It’s one indignity after the next, both for Saba, who has to beg for the job to begin with, and for Shirin, who has no choice but to wait in bed until Saba can bathe her and change her diaper.

Tales of such misfortune run the risk of veering into pity porn, but...

Bangladeshi filmmaker Maksud Hossain is set to unveil his feature directorial debut “Saba” at the Toronto Film Festival. The film tells the story of a young woman who is the sole caregiver for her paraplegic mother in Dhaka.

The project emerged from personal experience. Hossain’s wife Trilora Khan has been the primary caregiver for her paraplegic mother for 25 years following a car accident. After his father-in-law passed away suddenly from Covid-19, Hossain and Khan, who co-wrote the script, began developing a story about a lower-middle class woman in Dhaka facing caregiving challenges without family support or financial resources.

“We started thinking about what if we tell a story of a young woman, Saba, who lives in lower-middle class Dhaka, and she is taking care of her paraplegic mother by herself, without any family, without money. What would Saba do in a situation like this to make sure that her mother lives at any cost?...