By Suman Bhuchar
AN AWARD-WINNING filmmaker from Saudi Arabia has said her love for her craft was sparked by watching Indian films on DVD while growing up in the conservative country.
Haifaa Al Mansour’s debut feature Wadjda received the Satyajit Ray Foundation’s 16th annual feature film award, which was presented to the director on International Women’s Day (March 8) in London.
The first feature film to be shot entirely inside Saudi Arabia, Wadjda, set in Riyadh, is the story of an eponymous ten-year old heroine wants to ride a bike so that she can beat her friend, Abdullah in a race. In a country where girls can’t go out alone, and need the consent of a male guardian for everything, this is a tall order.
Head of the jury for the Ray foundation, Clyde Jeavons, said the film was “honest and engaging, excellently acted by the mainly female leading cast”.
He said the foundation’s award is given annually to a director of any nationality for their first feature film screened at London Film Festival, which best captures, the artistry, humanity and compassion expressed in Ray’s film vision.
Wadjda, which depicts what life is really like for girls and women in Saudi Arabia,.was shown at a special screening at the British Film Institute at South Bank, London.
Al Mansour, a shy and softly-spoken filmmaker, said she “grew up as one of 12 kids in a small town in Saudi Arabia, with nothing to do.
“My father used to bring a lot of films, just to keep us quiet. I saw the world; it was my first exposure to emotions. I feel in love with the medium, I never thought that I would be ever film-maker; it was a dream beyond my small world.”
The 39-year-old was employed at a petrol company in Saudi Arabia and it was while worked in the company’s communications department that she began learning how to make videos. Short films about life around her followed, and a documentary, Women Without Shadows (2005) about the hidden lives of women in the Middle East, was screened at the American Embassy. She met her husband, a US diplomat, there and when he was posted to Australia, she completed a master’s degree in film studies from the University of Sydney.
Her film’s protagonist, Wadjda is quietly subversive. She enters a Qu’ran reciting contest in order to raise money herself for the bike ride.
Meanwhile, her mother, played by Reem Abdullah, struggles to cope with the knowledge that her husband wants to take a second wife, so he can have a son, as daughters do not feature in the family tree.
The school headmistress, Miss Hissa, is played by another talented Saudi film-maker and actress, Ahd Kamel, who keep her pupils in check (along religious lines), while they yearn to put nail varnish on their toes, listen to Western music or do things other teenagers take for granted.
Al Mansour said it took her five years to perfect the script of Wadjda, while attending writing camps at the Berlin film festival. The film was co-produced by Germany’s Razor film and a Saudi Company, Rotana Studios and partly financed by the kingdom’s Prince Al Walid Bin Talal.
Although she got official permission, filming in Saudi Arabia had its challenges. She had to hide in a van, and directed her actors via walkie talkie.
Al Mansour is aware that conservative Saudi society can be unforgiving to people who fall out of step with it, but insists it is also undergoing changes; recently 30 women were voted on to the Shura Council.
“I know a lot of people are against empowering woman,” she said. “They think it is threatening their values. I feel for them and it is very important for me to make a film that is not offensive, as much as it is intimate and portrays something about the culture.”
She stresses that it is important to capitalise on changes and push forward.
“It is very important to coexist between liberal voices and conservative voices; it is about dialogue and exchanging ideas.”
She is keen for her film to be seen in Saudi Arabia, and this movie has reignited a debate again about whether the kingdom should have cinemas. There are DVDs and soaps on television are popular with the population.
Wadjda was released in France across 170 screens and it is said that the French President, François Hollande, asked for Al Mansour’s email.
Wadjda: On general is release from July 19.
(This article first appeared in Eastern Eye on March 22, 2013)
