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Mohamed Kordofani’s Goodbye Julia and Kaouther Ben Hania’s Four Daughters lead the nominations for the 8th Critics Awards for Arab Films, which will be held during the upcoming Cannes Film Festival.

Both features picked up seven nominations apiece for the awards, focused on Arab films that were produced and premiered outside of the Arab world in 2023. Overseen and run by the Cairo-based Arab Cinema Centre (Acc), it was voted on by 209 critics from 72 countries and the winners will be announced during Cannes on May 18.

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This year’s nominees range from Sudan,...

Tunisian filmmaker Kaouther Ben Hania’s Oscar-nominated documentary Four Daughters and Sudanese director Mohamed Kordofani’s Lupita Nyong’o-EPed drama Goodbye Julia lead the nominations in the eighth edition of the Critics Awards for Arab Films.

Hybrid work Four Daughters, exploring the story of a real-life Tunisian mother who lost two of her daughters to Isis after they were radicalized by a local preacher, world premiered in Competition in Cannes last year.

The film won Cannes’ Golden Eye for Best Documentary and also went on to be nominated for Best Documentary at the 2024 Academy Awards.

Kordofani’s Khartoum-set drama Goodbye Julia was also at Cannes in 2023, making history as the first Sudanese film to play in the festival across its 76 editions, with a debut in Un Certain Regard. It represented Sudan at in the 2023-24 Oscar race but was not nominated.

Set against the backdrop of the 2011 South Sudan Independence referendum,...

As we have mentioned many times before, the documentary format has been improving significantly through the latest years, particularly due to the increased exposure of the category due to both festivals and streaming services. With the main motto here being that ‘reality goes beyond any kind of imagination', the stories presented have been shocking and at the same time, quite entertaining, particularly since a number of Asian countries have started loosening the control over information available and the overall censorship. Even in countries that have not done the same, the result is actually similar, due to the diaspora filmmakers, who, outside the confines of authorities, managed to say all those things they were supposed not to. Lastly, the rise of the mockumentary, which seems to be included in various programs more as documentary rather than fiction, adds even more depth to the category.

Without further ado, here are the best...

The rise of quality in the entries of this list becomes evident every year, with movies from countries such as Israel, Turkey, Saudi Arabia, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Jordan finding a number of way outs through festivals and streamers, winning awards all over. Of course, Iran still heads the region, as its biggest movie industry, but the biggest surprise this year came from Sri Lanka, which produced three films of true quality.

Without further ado, here are the best West-Central Asian (rest of Asia one could say) films of 2023, in random order. Some films may have premiered in 2022, but since they mostly circulated in 2023, we decided to include them.

20. Under the Sky of Damascus by Heba Khaled, Talal Derki, Ali Wajeeh (Syria)

“Under the Sky of Damascus” is a great documentary, a testament to the quality and the impact of the medium, and a movie that truly deserved the International Competition Golden...