Powered by Blogger.

Woman beats the odds to make Saudi Arabia's first film

VENICE, Italy: The female director of Saudi Arabia's first feature film, showing at the Venice film festival, has explained how she beat the odds to produce the heartwarming tale of a girl's quest to own a bicycle.
In Haifaa Al Mansour's landmark film "Wadjda," 10-year-old Waad Mohammed plays a girl who is also testing the boundaries of a woman's place in a highly conservative society where her love for Western music and fashions land her in trouble.

Mohammed's impish personality and resilience in the face of adversity add to the poignancy of the story and left some of the film's first viewers in tears.

"She had this
vulnerability and she embodied what a Saudi teenager is," Al Mansour said, speaking in the lush courtyard of the Excelsior hotel.

"I wanted to show the tension between modernity and tradition," she said.

Al Mansour said she was forced to direct what is her first feature film from a van with a walkie-talkie in some of the more conservative neighbourhoods where she could not be seen in public together with male crew and cast members.

In some areas, screaming local residents would block shooting altogether.

She said finding financing also posed a problem in a country where cinemas are officially banned and any film is considered a commercial risk.

"Wadjda" will only be available in the kingdom on DVD or on television.

"There is no film in Saudi Arabia. Showing films in public is illegal so we don't have this culture of filmmaking. I was never able to go on a film set and get training and see how things are. It was very difficult," she said.

Al Mansour grew up in a small Saudi town as one of 12 siblings and she said her parents were always very supportive of her career even though they came under pressure from relatives who said filmmaking was "not honourable."

15:18 | |

This entry was posted on 15:18 You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

 

0 comments:

Post a Comment

Subscribe to: Post Comments (Atom)
Blogger Tips and TricksLatest Tips And TricksBlogger Tricks
1 Share/Bookmark

Labels

Blogger Tips and TricksLatest Tips And TricksBlogger Tricks