The Doha Film Institute (DFI) announced that 29 film projects from 16 countries have been chosen for its Spring Grants 2017, which supports regional and international first- and second-time filmmakers, as well as established Arab directors for short and feature-length films.
In addition to two films from Qatari filmmakers, the grantees include 24 projects from the Mena region, and have been chosen from Angola to Indonesia, bringing powerful new cinematic voices from across the world.
With the 2017 Spring Grants cycle, the total number of projects supported by DFI’s Grants programme now stands at over 340.
The line-up includes 14 feature-length narrative films, eight feature documentaries, two feature experimental or essay films and five short films - that will receive funding for development, production or post-production.
The Spring 2017 cycle marks the 14th session of the DFI grants programme, dedicated to supporting new cinematic voices from the Mena region and around the world.
Announcing the projects at Cannes Film Festival, Fatma al-Remaihi, chief executive officer of the DFI, said: “The new grantees cover a broad range of subjects and represent some powerful new voices in cinema from the Arab region and beyond, highlighting the remarkable leaps in creativity by our emerging filmmakers, and their innovative and bold approach to story-telling.”
There are four projects each from Algeria and Egypt, three from Tunisia and two each from Lebanon, Iran, Morocco, and Palestine. One project each comes from Bahrain, Kuwait, Jordan, Portugal, Somalia, Syria, France and Indonesia. Of the 29 projects, 19 are helmed by women directors, including Nothingwood (France, Germany, Qatar) by Sonia Kronlund that has been selected for screening in the 2017 Directors’ Fortnight at Cannes.
Four films are from the GCC region including two shorts by Qatari directors - Last Day at Home by Noor al-Nasr and The Black Veil by A J al-Thani. Two projects have been nurtured by DFI-led initiatives; A Man on Fire (Lebanon, Qatar) by Ibrahim Harb, and Days of Grace (Bahrain, Lebanon, Qatar) by Saleh Nass, were both part of the 2016 DFI Producers Lab, with the latter also mentored at the 2017 Hezayah Screenwriting Lab, organised in partnership with TorinoFilmLab.
The GCC projects, apart from films by Qatari directors, are Days of Grace and Soaring Over Mayhem (Kuwait, Qatar) by Abdullah Al-Wazzan.
The animation projects selected for this cycle include Inside Me (Egypt, Germany, Qatar) by Halla Tarek, and Night (Palestine, Jordan, Germany, Qatar) by Ahmed Saleh.
The two established directors from Mena who will receive post-production funding are Annemarie Jacir for Wajib (Palestine, UAE, France, Switzerland, Norway, Colombia, Qatar) and Amal Ramsis for You Come from Far Away (Egypt, Lebanon, Qatar).
Submissions for the next funding round open July 18 and close July 31. Funding is available to projects by first and second-time filmmakers from around the world, with an emphasis on support for filmmakers from the Mena region. Certain categories of funding are reserved for Mena and Qatari filmmakers. Post-production funding is available to established filmmakers from the Mena region.
