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In the Persian Gulf, known for its conservative Muslim beliefs, young filmmakers are stirring up debate on such issues as forced marriage and wearing the veil through an art form that until now has been confined largely to the shadows.

Indeed, some of those artists come from Saudi Arabia, a country where cinemas are banned.

More than 100 films from Gulf countries and from Iraq were presented in the third edition of the Dubai Film Festival, which took place last week.

“The films have addressed important and bold topics and, despite some weaknesses, these experiments foreshadow a promising future for Gulf cinema,” said Yemen’s first woman filmmaker and member of the jury, Khadija al-Salami.

Iraq — with a longer tradition of cinematography than its neighbors — won nine of the 13 prizes awarded at the festival, including first prize in the feature film category awarded to Shawkat Amin Korki for “Kick Off.”

“Kick Off” portrays the lives of Kurdish families who take refuge in a shantytown in Iraqi Kurdistan. The film highlights the plight of refugees in the war-ravaged country, centering on a boy who organizes a football game in an effort to make life less miserable.

Runner-up in the feature category was “City of Life,” by Emirati director Ali Mustafa. “City of Life” follows the stories of an Emirati man, a European woman and an Indian taxi driver whose paths cross in Dubai, illustrating how characters from different strands of society interact in the cosmopolitan city state.

In “Haneen” (“Longing”), Hussein al-Hulaybi becomes Bahrain’s first director to address relations between Sunnis and Shiites — a sensitive subject in the only Gulf country with a Shiite majority and a Sunni monarchy.

The Dubai festival also uncovered a generation of daring female directors, who are starting to question some long-standing taboos. One particularly bold step was taken by Saudi filmmaker Reem al-Bayyat, who addresses the issue of forced marriage in her short film “Doll.”

“It is a common practice in the region. The girl is treated like a doll, lacking the freedom to choose,” said producer Samar al-Bayyat, who is the director’s sister. The film was made with the assistance of several Bayyat family members.

“I hope one day we can see our films projected in Saudi Arabia and open up a debate,” Samar al-Bayaat said.

In the student film category, Omani director Muzna al-Musafir confronts the question of the veil in her film “Niqab,” which tells the story of a veiled woman who is haunted by doubts as she prepares for a rendezvous. Niqab is named after the veil that some ultraconservative Muslim women wear to conceal their faces. “Some women are forced to wear the niqab. We should not have prejudice toward them, as a fully veiled woman also has her own personality and positions,” said Musafir, 22, who wears her hair in a short bob.

Two Emirati students, Maitha Hamdan and Maryam ben Ali, chose to address the exaggerated dowries that families demand for their daughters’ hand in marriage.

“The film contains a series of interviews in which many young men say they prefer to marry foreigners to escape paying the dowry. It is a real problem,” Maitha Hamdan said.

Some students like Moza al-Sharif, also from the UAE, presented lighter films like “The Second Wife,” a documentary on the way men in the Gulf can be more affectionate toward their cars than toward their wives.

“This is a cinema still in its infancy, but there is much hope,” said Moroccan filmmaker and chairman of the jury Jillali Ferhati.  



Agence France-Presse