abu dhabi film festival sanad fund booklet 2010

SANADDevelopment &PoSt-ProDuctioN

FunD For ArAb FilmmAkerS

ABOUT SANADEstablished in 2010, SANAD (connoting "support" in Arabic) is the Abu Dhabi Film Festival’s development and post-production fund. It provides talented filmmakers from the Arab world with meaningful support from within the region towards the development or completion of their narrative and documentary feature-length films.

The fund seeks out bold and remarkable projects from both new and established filmmakers with the aim of encouraging intercultural dialogue and artistic innovation while building stronger networks within the region’s film industry. SANAD also offers year-round support and publicity for selected projects to help connect filmmakers to potential partners, funding opportunities and audiences.

SANAD has US$500,000 at its disposal annually and makes grants in two categories:• Development: up to US$20,000 per project• Post-production: up to US$60,000 per project

there are two open calls for applications each year.the director or producer must be a national of one of the countries listed below, and a production company from at least one of these countries must be attached to the project. the eligible countries are Algeria, Bahrain, Comoros Islands, Djibouti, egypt,Iraq, Jordan, Kuwait, lebanon, libya, mauritania, morocco, oman, palestine, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Somalia, Sudan, Syria, tunisia, uAe and Yemen.

For more information visit: www.abudhabifilmfestival.ae

SANAD 2010The film world responded with great enthusiasm to the launch of SANAD, with dozens of submissions received in the first few weeks alone.

During the selection process, the SANAD team was excited to discover a fascinating new trend in Arab film: A large number of filmmakers from all over the region are developing experimental, daring films. Describing 2010 as the ‘Year of the Independents’, the team noted that there was a marked trend towards artistic innovation and radical departures from the conventional in style, language and approach.

Young directors were not the only ones taking thematic and stylistic risks; seasoned directors also strayed from the beaten path. Broken narrative structures, off-kilter characters and unconventional image compositions were used to pose serious questions about the status quo. Even though political engagement remains mostly abstract and indirect, these films are bound to surprise viewers.

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DFive SANAD projects screened in the Festival in 2010.

HErE COmES THE rAIN by Bahij Hojeij

IN mY mOTHEr’S ArmS by Atia Al-Daradji, mohamed Al-Daradji

OK, ENOUgH, gOODBYE by rania Attieh, Daniel garcia

QArANTINAby Oday rasheed

SUN DrESS by Saeed Salmeen

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poSt-proDuCtIon ProjectS2010

nArrAtIveDeAtH For SAle Director: Faouzi bensaïdi moroCCo, BelgIum, FrAnCe Producers: Souad Lamriki, Sebastien Delloye Production Company: Agora film, Entre Chien ET LoupContact: Sebastien Delloye Entre Chien Et [email protected]

Project logline: malik, Allal and Soufiane, three friends, make their living as pickpockets in tetouan. one day, they decide to change their destiny and they rob the town’s largest jewellery store. But each of them has a different reason to join the heist and they are soon pitted against one another ...

Director's Quote: After www.what a wonderful world, a playful genre film, Death for Sale will continue to explore the same genre, moving towards the linearity of pure storytelling. But will the genre and its codes remain impervious to profound reality, to a changing world?

iN tHe lASt DAYS oF tHe citY Director: tamer el-Said egYpt, unIteD KIngDom Producers: Khalid Abdalla, Cat Villiers Production Company: Zero Production Autonomous LimitedContact: Khalid AbdallaZero [email protected]

Project logline: In the fading grandeur of downtown Cairo, Khalid struggles to make a film about the city in which he is losing everything he loves: he is about to be kicked out of his apartment; the woman he loves is emigrating; and the death of his father has reawakened memories of his childhood, when Cairo and his country seemed a brighter world.

Director's

Quote:

I am making this film out of love for my city and because I want to show its contradictions – its rising violence and invisible magic, and the story of our silence as we watch our cities being conquered by oppression, ignorance and extremism. In Cairo, like in every other city in the middle east, there is the feeling that we can’t keep going like this – the end is near, and it might be violent.

Here comeS tHe rAiN Director: bahij Hojeij leBAnon Producers: Bahij Hojeij, Paul Baboudjian Production Company: Online films-BeirutContact: Bahij Hojeij Online [email protected]

Project logline: A typical lebanese family is confronted with the unexpected return of a physically and morally devastated man. Here Comes the Rain asks the question, Is a return to a normal life possible for a man who was kidnapped, tortured and forgotten for 20 years?

Director's Quote:

the subject of my new film falls in line with the work I started in 1998 with Kidnapped, my documentary about the lebanese civil war.Here, I tackle the subject of the civil war by touching not on disappearance, but on return. Despite the gravity of its subject, the film offers a message of love and hope.

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nArrAtIveoN tHe PlANk Director: leila kilani moroCCo, FrAnCe Producers: Leila Kilani, Charlotte Vincent Production Company: Socco-Chico Films, Aurora Films Contact: Charlotte Vincent Aurora [email protected]

Project logline: Badia has a dream, an ambition: to take a rest form the alienation of the world around her. the common goal for her and those around her? the luxury of rest.

Director's Quote: the Free Zone sits along the Atlantic coast, south of tangier, a symbol for global world sub-contracting. It is europe on moroccan land, on African land: the Free Zone is close, tangible, yet accessible only to those with a work permit. It is open for fantasy…

mY brotHer Director: kamal el mahouti moroCCo, FrAnCe Producer: Kamal El Mahouti Production Company: Molilou Productions, Lyrd Contact: Kamal El mahouti Molilou [email protected]

Project logline: After a break-up, mo Bensalah, a painter, throws himself body and soul into his art. Built like a pictorial and sensory puzzle, My Brother is the portrait of an artist held captive between France and morocco, set to the throbbing rhythms of folk gnawa music.

Director's Quote: My Brother is a film about the internal struggles and complexity of being at once French, Arab and muslim today.

ok, eNouGH, GooDbYe Directors: rania Attieh, Daniel Garcia leBAnon Producer: Rania Attieh Production Company: Enpassant FilmContact: rania Attieh Enpassant [email protected]

Project logline: In tripoli, lebanon, where family bonds still run deep, a forty-year-old man still living with his elderly mother has given up on the idea of becoming independent. But when suddenly his mother leaves him, he is left with nothing but the company of a city and what it offers.

Directors' Quote: this film is a collection of our memories and impressions of a city and the people who live and work in it. Stylistically, we tend to follow a realist approach to our work, using a mix of narrative and documentary aesthetics.

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Sun Dress

Qarantina

ok, enough, Goodbye

nArrAtIveHere comes the rain

SuN DreSSDirector: Saeed Salmeen unIteD ArAB emIrAteS, SYrIA Producer: Saeed Salmeen Production Company: UAE Films Contact: Saeed SalmeenUAE [email protected]

Project logline: A personal story of hardship and disability set in our global environment. We are called to witness the unfulfilled dreams and daily struggles of characters as they find their place in society and endure their life's journey under the sun.

Director's Quote: this film brought together the best of both worlds from the united Arab emirates and Syria. locations can have a lasting impact on a film and both the red Island and the countryside around Damascus breathed new life into our story and allowed us to create both dramatic reality and fantasy with our own Arab touch.

QArANtiNADirector: oday rasheed IrAQ, germAnY Producers: Dr. Shafiq Al Mahdi, Furat Al Jamil Production Company: The Directorate of Cinema & Theater (Iraq), Enlil Film & Art, DIEBASISberlinContact: Furat al-Jamil Enlil Film & [email protected] Project logline: Crime, passion and childhood innocence in an Iraqi crime tale. Director's Quote: Qarantina is my second visual expression of my impressions of my country – my hometown, Baghdad – and its reality since 2003. At least to me, it is a portrayal of inhumane and unnatural events in a society struggling with post-war trauma.

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iN mY motHer’S ArmS Directors: Atia Al-Daradji, mohamed Al-Daradji IrAQ, unIteD KIngDom Producers: Atia Al- Daradji, Isabelle Stead Production Company: Iraq Al-rafidain, Human Film Contact: Isabelle Stead Human Film (UK)[email protected]

moHAmmAD SAVeD From tHe WAterS Director: Safaa Fathy egYpt, FrAnCe Producers: Sherif Mandour, Delphine morelProduction Company: Filmhouse Egypt, T.S Productions Contact: Delphine morel T.S. [email protected]

DoCumentArY


Project logline: meet 32 football crazed children – youngsters like any others except that they must live, sleep, eat and study in the same room in a rented two-room house. orphans of war and sectarian violence, they have no one to look after them except Husham, who operates a small orphanage that funds itself. When the landlord informs Husham he must relocate in two months, the struggle to keep the children on track begins.

Director's Quote: over the last 40 years, Iraq has experienced three wars and two occupations. this has left the country with little to no infrastructure to care for the thousands of orphans the conflict has produced. our hope through this film is to raise international awareness of the problems facing Iraq’s most vulnerable.

Project logline:my brother mohammad suffers from kidney failure due to the pollution of the nile. He refuses a transplant for personal and ethical reasons. In following his journey to recovery, the film looks into these reasons and the complex family ties that instigate his rescue.

Director's Quote:my motivations in making this film are emotional, philosophical, political, personal and ontological. It is a gift to my brother and the people of egypt.

in my mother’s Arms

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DevelopmentProjectS 2010

nArrAtIveAZiZA DoeSN’t kNoW WHAt SHe SAYS Director: Nadia el Fani tunISIA Producer: Nadia El Fani Production Company: Z’yeux Noirs moviesContact: Nadia El Fani Z’Yeux Noirs [email protected]

Project logline: Aziza is a comedian and a ventriloquist. one day, another voice, which comes from the depths of her being, is suddenly going to express itself regardless of her will. She will systematically say the worst thing at the worst time in the worst way possible.

Director's Quote: Aziza sees her society changing against her will. one day she realizes that all the beautiful ideals of her youth were sacrificed to the advantage of a social and political consensus that she considers reactionary.

cHroNicleS oF mY VillAGe Director: karim bachir traidia AlgerIA, tHe netHerlAnDS Producers: Annemeik Van Gorp, rene goossens Production Company: De ProductieContact: Karim Bachir Traidia De [email protected]

Project logline: Chronicles of My Village is the story of Bachir's childhood during the Algerian war of independence. the film considers how a child's innocence, curiosity and dreams can play alongside the struggles of a country in search of its own identity.

Director's Quote: this is the story of the child I was during the Algerian war of liberation. the war is not the issue in the film; the story is about the years of my innocence, despite the war and its horrors.

Project logline: In a coffee shop in ramallah, three versions of one story tell how the remains of palestinian icon Yasser Arafat traveled to the esplanade of the mosque of Harm el Sharif in Jerusalem. A legend is on its way to freedom.

DeAD SeA Director: ihab jadallah pAleStIne, FrAnCe Producers: Lucas Rosant, Juliette Lepoutre, Ihab Jadallah Production Company: MPM film, AANAT FilmsContact: Juliette Lepoutre MPM Film [email protected]

Director's Quote: I belong to the post-utopia generation, the “stone kids” who grew up in Jerusalem, those who had a dream and never achieved it. In Dead Sea, I use the figure of Arafat as a symbol and his personal and national dreams as an utopia. through the three stories of Dead Sea, I would like to “dream” of achieving freedom and liberation.

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ibN bAttutA Director: tariq teguia AlgerIA, leBAnon, FrAnCe, greeCe Producers: Yacine Teguia, Ghassan Salhab, Frederic Lemaigre Production Company: Neffa Films, mirrors, CapturesContact: Tariq TeguiaNeffa [email protected]

Project logline: Ibn Battuta, an Algerian journalist, picks up the trail of long-forgotten uprisings in Iraq. His investigation first takes him to Beirut, a city that once embodied the hopes and struggles of all the Arab World.

Director's Quote: the question that comes to mind: how conceivable is it to undertake a film with the intention of shooting ghost matter?

ForeiGN boDY Director: raja Amari tunISIA, FrAnCe Producer: Dora Bouchoucha Production Company: Nomadis ImagesContact: raja Amari Nomadis [email protected]

Project logline: Samia, a young illegal immigrant, finds a job with a middle-class parisian household. Her presence dramatically changes the relations among the members of the family. the most dependent person is not always the one we expect...

Director's Quote: I like characters’ development to be liberating and driven by desire. Beyond social emancipation, what interests me most is how one may surpass oneself.’

nArrAtIvePlAYGrouND StorieS Director: brahim Fritah FrAnCe Producers: Philippe Delarue Production Company: FuturikonContact: Brahim [email protected]

Project logline: Playground Stories, drawn from the author's childhood memories, is set in 1981. ten-year-old Brahim gives us a taste of daily life for a moroccan family in a paris suburb, spiced with poetry and humour.

Director's Quote: Playground Stories is based on my own memories, whether real or imaginary. this film is a journey back to my childhood, through the eyes of little Brahim, my narrative twin. the narrative path follows the meandering route of one's memories, shaped by a writer's objectivity, enabling me to take fiction even further

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nArrAtIve

Director's Quote: All the characters of the film are suffering from their inability to express their emotions at the moment when they most need to open up. this is a film about how we make our own prisons by accepting with great nobility a life that is anything but noble.

Project logline: those who have fully enjoyed their bodies cannot be submissive. And those who have not? Can they survive the slavery of solitude and impotent acceptance of what they cannot change or embrace? this is the everyday story of two women taking care of a sick man.

tHe Stroke Director: Hala lotfy egYpt Producers: Hala Lotfy, Manal Lotfy Production Company: Zero Production CompanyContact: Hala Lotfy Zero Production [email protected]

trAiN StAtioN Director: mohamed Al-Daradji IrAQ, unIteD KIngDom, tHe netHerlAnDS Producers: Isabelle Stead, Atia Al-Daradji Production Company: Human Film, Iraq Al-rafidainContact: Isabelle Stead Human Film (UK)[email protected] Project logline: the last wish of Hayat, a young female suicide bomber, at Baghdad’s Central train Station, 90 seconds before she may do the unthinkable...

Director's Quote: When I look at my previous films, I recognize that I have made bold statements on issues. now, I challenge myself to tell a simple story of love in a more artistic way that will put forward controversial themes of how my culture perceives women. Inshallah, with this film we can challenge and change some of those perceptions.

ViA DoloroSA Director: Sobhi Al Zobaidi pAleStIne Producers: Rashid Masharawi, Julia Fraser Production Company: Cinema Production Center, Tanah LicinContact: Sobhi Al-ZobaidiCinema Production Center [email protected]

Project logline: After many years of visiting her husband in an Israeli prison, a palestinian woman goes to see her son in the same prison – which, after the oslo Accords, has become palestinian.

Director's Quote: the fact is, we palestinians need to look in the mirror and face the truth about ourselves. this mirror of disillusionment is being constructed from works of art, literature and cinema. I see my film in this larger context, a film that contributes to the building of this mirror.

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nArrAtIveWiSH tHe liGHt HAS AN eYe to See Director: mohamad malas SYrIAProducers: Mohamad Malas, Thierry Lenouvel Production Company: Dunia Film, Cine- Sud PromotionContact: mohamad malasDunia [email protected]

Project logline: At the end of the last century, a novelist and her 18-year old son live with questions of love while the father is doomed to political imprisonment.

Director's Quote: An independent work of cinema in Syria, this film will complete the trilogy in which I attempt to draw a sociopolitical portrait of Syria in the second half of the twentieth century.

WHeN i SAW You Director: Annemarie jacir JorDAn Producer: Ossama Bawardi Production Company: Lamma Shoftak LLC, Memento FilmsContact: Ossama Bawardi Lamma Shoftak [email protected]

Project logline: Jordan in the late 1960s. An eccentric boy runs away from home knowing full well his young mother will follow him in the search for freedom.

Director's Quote: When I Saw You is a portrait of hope – of that very specific moment in a person’s life when the whole world opens up. It may be brief … maybe it’s gone by morning. It’s that one moment where your heart feels like it might explode and everything is possible.

ZANkA coNtAct Director: ismael el maoula el iraki FrAnCe, moroCCo Producers: David Fenkel, Jerome Dauberfer, Sebastien Haguenaueur Production Company: Shadows Productions, Balthazar ProductionsContact: Ismael El maoula El IrakiShadows Production Balthazar [email protected] Project logline: Irish ex-rock star oisin lost his voice and sobriety to cancer. When he meets a golden-voiced streetwalker in Casablanca, everything becomes possible again: music, even love... unless her pimp says otherwise. then again, they say music soothes even the savage beast, don’t they?

Director's Quote: Zanka Contact mixes western and romance, violence and laughter, rock ‘n’ roll and traditional desert music. It is directly inspired by the crazy mix of western and eastern influences that is Casablanca. I hope it will do it justice.

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iN SeArcH oF oil AND SAND Director: Philippe laurent DibegYpt Producer: Wael Omar Sayed-El-Ahl Production Company: Middle West FilmsContact: Wael Omar Sayed-el-Ahl Middle West Films [email protected]

Project logline: oil & Sand was a film extravaganza made in 1952 by members of the egyptian royal Family, their friends and relatives. As they shot their movie, a military coup d'état was mere weeks away from sweeping them out of power. Sixty years later, three 8mm reels and a set of memoirs are discovered in an attic.

Director's Quote: the film questions the very nature of history versus fiction and how often they crisscross. I seek, through a very personal story, to explore the very nature of egypt’s legacy and its conundrums.

lebANeSe rocket SocietY Directors: joana Hadjithomas, khalil joreige leBAnonProducers: Georges Schoucair, Edouard mauriat Production Company: Abbout Productions, Mille ET Une ProductionsContact: Khalil Joreige Abbout [email protected] Project logline: From 1960 to 1967, a space project was undertaken in lebanon, in which several rockets were launched from the hills surrounding Beirut by scientists, university students and army experts. this group was called the lebanese rocket Society.

Director's Quote: this feature documentary relates an unconventional and surprising “conquest of space.” Documents, reconstructed images and meetings with the various people involved in this adventure – all of whom had, for a moment, their head in the stars – unveil political issues that are still relevant today.

AS iF We Were cAtcHiNG A cobrA Director: Hala Alabdalla SYrIA, FrAnCe Producers: Frederic Feraud, Hala Alabdalla; Production Company: Ramad Film, L’oeil Sauvage (France)Hala Alabdallaramad [email protected]

Project logline: In newspapers around the world, satirical cartoons make us laugh, cry and contemplate our world… they can provoke and upset us as well. they are also the best measure of a country’s freedom of expression.

Director's Quote: What is it to be Arab? Is it a cultural identity, a virtual weapon or an indispensable refuge, a place to hide from danger? these are questions that challenge the mind of the citizen of an Arab nation, despite the “Arab-ness” of the education to which he is subjected.

DoCumentArY

SeDuctioNDirector: omar Amiralay SYrIA Producer: Orwa Nyrabia Production Company: Proaction FilmContact: Orwa Nyrabia Proaction [email protected]

Project logline: they met 30 years ago: Ighra’, the sex symbol of Syrian cinema and the first Arab woman to appear nude on screen; he the politically engaged doc maker. She said, "We have something in common; you'll find out one day!" thirty years later, they meet.

Director's Quote: It is her character, her personality that deserves attention. It is where the seduction lies, certainly for the “filmmaker.” She emblematizes, to the letter, the state of Arab societies. Whether regarding the status of women or the rise of religious extremism, she has accompanied, since the years of her glory, the astounding decline we have all been enduring.

mY jiNN Director: Dalia Al kury JorDAn, germAnY Producers: Carl-Ludwig Rettinger, Dalia Al Kury Production Company: Dalia Al Kury Productions, Lichtblick FilmDalia Al-Kury, Carla Dabis Dalia Al-Kury [email protected]@gmail.com

Project logline: If so many people in the Islamic world have experienced the Jinn, then what role do they play? What can these supernatural creatures reflect about our darkest, most hidden desires?

Director's Quote:In rural Jordan, Jinn sheikhs still play the role of psychologists and doctors. In believing in the Jinn, a strict traditional society has created a loophole where out-of-the-norm behavior can be tolerated. By listening to the people involved, I hope to push my limits of understanding the meaning of faith.”


DoCumentArY oCtoBer 13-22, 2011

5tHAbu DHAbi

Film FeStiVAl

Film SubmiSSioNS Open: April 1 Close: July 1

SANAD 2011 SANAD provides talented filmmakers from the Arab world with meaningful support towards developing or completing their narrative and documentary feature-length films.

Deadlines for Development & Post-Production grants1st cycle: February 15 2nd cycle: July 1

www.abudhabifilmfestival.aefacebook.com/abudhabifftwitter.com/abudhabiff

abu dhabi film festival sanad fund booklet 2010

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