Projects 2024-2025
September 22, 2024
Projects 2022/2023
October 19, 2022
Projects 2023-2024
Projects 2023-2024
CLOSE UP
We are thrilled to announce the selection of 13 projects from Southwest Asia and North Africa for the upcoming 2023-2024 Close Up program, out of a total of 121 applications received from across the region!
26 LOVE LETTERS
Zineb Chafchaoni Moussaoui
Producer Merieme Addou
The film delves into the journey of my uncle, a political prisoner, whose arrest shook the very foundation of our family. He found liberation from the confines of incarceration through writing heartfelt letters. Meanwhile, my father sought solace in the universe of training goldfinches, instilling in it the art of singing. This pursuit served as a sanctuary, allowing him to momentarily escape the brutal reality. My uncle never wanted to share details about what happened. Was my dad’s immersion into the world of birds an attempt to escape harsh reality, or was it his way of confronting it head-on?
BERLINER
Director/Producer Anna Khazaradze
Producer Nino Chichua
Berliner follows Nana, a middle-aged immigrant woman from Georgia who works as an interpreter for the Berlin law enforcement authority and a refugee facility. She translates testimonies of criminal suspects from Post-Soviet countries and aids newly arrived refugees. Set in the cosmopolitan city of Berlin against an ongoing political backdrop, the film delves into the life of Nana—a translator woman who serves as both a mediator and an information receiver, engaged in a permanent process of translation. She guides us through the closed off institutions and invites us to hear different stories through translations. We are becoming observers of how she receives, processes, and translates information, both literally and metaphorically. Nana’s life serves as a continuous projection of the information she absorbs. Through her story, the film aims to unravel the significance of translations and how these linguistic bridges impact her life and others around her.
BURST BALL
Aliye Akbay Tuzun
Producer Göksel Tuzun
Girls living in a backward region of Turkey are introduced to rugby, a sport they have never heard of before, thanks to a teacher who comes to their school. They’ve learned to play rugby with a burst basketball ball. But there were barriers for the girls: their families, cultural codes, and society. At first, this sport was not accepted by the family. Their introduction to sports allowed them to discover new worlds, and they managed to overcome the barriers in time. The Burst Ball is a project about women’s struggles that looks like a story focused on sports.
FRAME MAKER
A young filmmaker discovers his uncle’s unseen photographs from Middle Eastern political affairs in the 1970s. Together in Europe, where the uncle lives in exile, they explore these images and family footage. Through their dialogue between two generations of artists, the film delves into family, archives, and private history over the past decades, highlighting the political impact on artists and ordinary people’s lives.
I FELL IN LOVE WITH A DEAD WOMAN
Anahit Ghazaryan
An uncanny coincidence triggers an obsessive search through time and space in Turkey, bonding together two Armenian female photographers: a young contemporary artist from Armenia and Turkey’s first female professional studio photographer, who was born in the early twentieth century and has long since departed.
HOW TO TALK TO LYDIA?
Rusudan Gaprindashvili
Producer Hans Gralke
LITTLE RED RIDING HOOD
Parvana Guliyeva
Amidst the rugged beauty of a secluded mountain village in Azerbaijan, 14-year-old Rose dreams of becoming a football player and painting of her sports idols. Rose struggles with conservative family values, economic difficulties and the impending threat of her recently released uncle, who attacks her family. Family’s livelihood depends on the small land, but the flood approaches the village every year and destroys the fields.
MORE THAN A FATHER
Ali Haider
Ali, a survivor of genocidal attack, joins his mother Sughra on a quest to find the soul of his father, who lost his life in the same attack. As the journey unfolds, love and grief, resilience and hope intertwine with each other.
MY MOTHERS’ TALE
Mizgin Mujde Arslan
In 1980s Turkey, a harrowing military coup leaves a fledgling Kurdish family to make a heartbreaking decision. The mother takes her eldest child, her son, leaving behind her youngest, a daughter, to be raised by her grandmother. Today, reunited, the mother and daughter confront the gaping chasm that grew between them. Will they overcome the emotional minefield when one seeks remembrance and the other longs to bury the past?
OUR FEMININE WARS
Zaina Erhaim
Producer Brian Hill
Women around the world fight unrecognized battles for their basic rights – even during war. Filmmaker Zaina Erhaim films herself and her female friends through this rare perspective, capturing their daily struggle since the uprising in Syria and until today while they live in exile as refugees – a period over more than 10 years. What has changed?
Zaina’s film explores the vital importance of sisterhood in the journey towards healing. Featuring personal storytelling and first-person footage, the film is a tribute to the resilience of women who refuse to be silenced.
SHALOM
Meital Zvieli
Producer Avigail Sperber
Shalom the Rhinoceros, a beloved celebrity at the Biblical Zoo, is cared for by Rushdi, a Palestinian Muslim, and Gilad, an Israeli Jew. Injury forces a decision: Rushdi argues for natural death, but Gilad prefers to euthanize Shalom to end his suffering. Dr. Nili Avni delivers the final shots.The Gaza war brings chaos. Rushdi flies to France for a new rhino, Eno, seeing the zoo as a huge prison denying freedom. They prepare for stubborn Tupac, facing an unusual mission: brokering peace between two strong male rhinos in their cramped habitat
STRANGE SEA
Lala Aliyeva
Producer Aysel Akhundova
In the depths of the Caspian Sea the whispers of its dark past intertwine with the tales of ordinary life.’ Strange Sea’ paints an impressionistic portrait of Azerbaijan mirrored in the disappearing Caspian Sea, which has defined its identity for decades.
YOUR HONOUR
Bircan Birol
Producer Reece Cargan
Law student Efruz lives under constant threat to her safety and well-being for being transgender in today’s authoritarian Turkey. Her friend Bircan films her over the years, from Efruz’s transition to becoming a pioneering trans law student in the country. When Efruz’s dream of becoming a human rights lawyer is challenged more than ever, and her future hangs in the balance, the two friends set out on a journey to find strength in the past. Unearthing both painful and happy memories, they also find hope in their friendship, marked by a unique resilience called “gullüm,” a collective resistance infused with laughter. Their last stop is an imaginary courtroom where Efruz can freely dream and truly be herself—ready to say her final goodbye to the judges of her life.
