The films that will be funded, include works of fiction as well as documentaries and they are from Palestine, Lebanon, Jordan, Iraq, Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Egypt, Algeria, Morocco, and Tunisia.

Thanks to the Saudi Arabian organisation—the Red Sea Film Festival, 14 Arabic-language feature films will now receive funding for their production and post-production.

 
The support has been extended by the Red Sea Fund—a $14 million initiative launched by Saudi Arabia’s Red Sea Film Festival, earlier this year.

The films that will be funded, include works of fiction as well as documentaries and they are from Palestine, Lebanon, Jordan, Iraq, Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Egypt, Algeria, Morocco, and Tunisia.

The declaration came in during the ongoing Venice Film Festival this year, where the Saudi Arabian film industry and Red Sea Film Festival made their notable presence.

The funding has come as a great support to the Arab filmmaking industry, two of whose films are already on the international festival circuit.

‘The Sea Ahead’ by Lebanese filmmaker and Short Film Palme d’Or winner Ely Dagher was presented at the Cannes Directors’ Fortnight, while Jordanian director Darin J Sallam is set to premiere her first feature film ‘Farha’ at the coming Toronto International Film Festival.

Apart from these the other films that have been selected include Communion by Nejib Belkadhi, Take Me to the Cinema by Albaqer Jaafar, Soula by Salah Issaad, Quareer by Ragheed Al Nahdi, Norah Almowald, Ruba Khafagy, Fatma Alhazmi, and Noor Alameer, Life Suits Me Well by Al Hadi Ulad-Mohand, Recovery by Rashid Masharawi, Route 10 by Omar Naim, Basma by Fatima Al-Banawi, I Am Arze by Mira Shaib, Inshallah A Boy by Amjad Al-Rasheed, The Arabic Interpreter by Ali Kareem Obaid, and The Wind Also Sings by Hadi Ghandour.

As the 14 films mark the first round of selections for this year’s funding programme, there were over 650 projects were submitted for funding consideration.