- 2 weeks ago
In this THR festival roundtable, recorded during the Red Sea International Film Festival, Baz Luhrmann, Ali Alkalthami, Kaouther Ben Hania, Asmae El Moudir, Amjad Al Rasheed and Amanda Nell Eu discus filmmaking, storytelling, and art in turbulent times.
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00:00Now, standing by, and let's center up, and action!
00:07Hello and welcome everybody to the Hollywood Reporters' first ever roundtable at the Red Sea International Film Festival here in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, sponsored by Neom.
00:16We have six great filmmakers here coming together despite a very, very busy festival schedule.
00:22I want to welcome over here Ali Al Khaldami, the hometown hero so to speak, here from Saudi Arabia.
00:29He has his movie Mandub in the competition, welcome.
00:33I also want to welcome Kautab and Haniyeh from Tunisia.
00:37Four Daughters is her movie that you can see here at the festival.
00:41To my right, Baz Luhrmann, young up-and-coming filmmaker you might hear more about.
00:47He's the jury president here at the Red Sea Festival.
00:51To my left, we have somebody who just won the Marrakesh award at the festival in case you have not heard.
00:58Esme El-Mudir from Morocco, The Mother of All Lies is a film that you can also see here.
01:03We also have with us Amshad Al-Rashid from Jordan.
01:07Inshallah, a boy, his movie can be seen here.
01:10And last but certainly not least, Amanda Nell Yu from Malaysia, Tiger Stripes is her competition entry.
01:17So, we basically cover the world here.
01:20And, you know, I wanted to ask, you know, one of the things that I always find interesting is, you know, all these people come together here at this film festival.
01:30Everybody has a different voice. Everybody has a different experience.
01:33Can you maybe share with us how you first knew that you wanted to make movies and why you felt that calling so strongly?
01:39I think it's a long journey for all of us, especially for me, because when I was young I thought that I wanted to write novels.
01:47I love literature and I was raised with books, reading all the time.
01:52So, for me, in my surrounding family there was nobody working on cinema.
01:58So, it's like something for other people, not for us.
02:02So, for me it was writing and storytelling.
02:05And little by little I discovered that I don't have a good style in writing, you know.
02:10It's too complicated for me, but I love writing and imagination.
02:16So, when I discovered amateur cinema in Toulouse, it was like a revelation for me.
02:20This is something I want to do.
02:22So, I love writing and now I love writing with images.
02:25This is mainly the journey.
02:28Wonderful.
02:29Well, very close. It started when I was ten years old and my mother asked me...
02:36So, five years ago?
02:37Five years ago, yeah.
02:39My mother asked me...
02:41You know, parents always ask their kids, what do you want to be when you grow up?
02:45So, I was like, I want to be a director.
02:48Which is funny, at that age I didn't know what director means.
02:52But I knew that I want to tell stories.
02:55We used to watch black and white movies for Fatin Hamama and Omar Sharif, Egyptian movies.
03:02And I was, these things, like, I want this word, this is what I want to do, to tell stories.
03:08And maybe because sometimes I feel when I was kid, people are not listening to me.
03:14So, I felt the urge of, I want to communicate with people and to communicate visually.
03:21And I start, like, following my dream, basically, and today I'm here.
03:31Speaking of dreams, winning an award at Marrakesh, congratulations.
03:35Yeah, it was a dream.
03:36Yeah, it was a dream.
03:37It was really a dream from...
03:39When I was 10, I was watching the ceremony of closing the TV, because it's always in direct.
03:46And then I go always on the table and I told my father to give me the tea, like a winner.
03:54And it was the same thing for me.
03:56After 15 years, I just got the first Etoile d'Or from Morocco.
04:02So, Moroccan were crazy that day.
04:04So, it was really nice.
04:05And also, I went culture, because telling stories is a necessity.
04:09Becoming a filmmaker, it's not a job.
04:12I mean, we want to tell something from inside, and then we need form.
04:18I try to draw, but I cannot even draw an apple.
04:23So, writing with a light is better, yeah.
04:26Same here.
04:27It's great.
04:28Kind of different in Saudi, because I guess we didn't have cinema.
04:33So, the aspiration to be a filmmaker wasn't in the mindset, but stories always gravitated me.
04:40I guess my father used to be the storyteller of the tribe.
04:47So, I always look at him when he's sitting with 50 men around our majlis, which is where you sit.
04:54And he would tell stories that is entertaining, and I would just listen to him.
04:58And the whole culture in Saudi is revolved around stories.
05:04Technically, came in using the camera to tell a story.
05:07And that's kind of later on stage of my life.
05:10And the internet came.
05:11So, I delve into translating that oral culture to how to do it right,
05:17and how to take from the West experience.
05:21So, it is there, but trying to experiment with mixing the two.
05:25You know, mixing that tradition of stories in Saudi, and with the techniques of cinema.
05:31So, that's kind of like how it begins.
05:36I think for me, it was really genre cinema.
05:39It was horror films.
05:40Wow.
05:41Yeah, when I was a young kid, I remember going to sleepovers with my friends
05:46and forcing them to video record Texas Chainsaw Massacre at 1am,
05:51and then the parents would find out, and they're like, you can't watch this.
05:55I'm like, why not?
05:56I love this.
05:57So, it started there.
05:58And of course, being an Asian person, this is not a thing you do, right?
06:03Directing.
06:04And so, I went to do graphic design for my degree,
06:07because I always loved working in visuals.
06:09But to this day, I still don't know how to use Photoshop,
06:12because I was just making short films, animations, like music videos.
06:16And so, I was like, okay, I have to do this.
06:19So, yeah, that was how it started.
06:21Nice.
06:22Nice.
06:23Tell us a little bit about what's important about the movie you brought to the festival,
06:26and what does it say about, how does it exemplify your storytelling voice?
06:31You know, how does it encapsulate what you're doing and what you like to do?
06:37I mean, yes, bringing films to the festivals.
06:40For me, it's like looking for audiences.
06:43When we change festivals, we change the audience.
06:46Carlo Vivari is not Toronto.
06:50Toronto is not Marrakesh.
06:54It's very important that you just listen to the audience.
06:59We make film for the audience, I think.
07:02That sounds great.
07:03Yeah, I think I totally agree.
07:05You know, it's been such a nice year to travel with the film,
07:09to do Q&As, to talk to the audience from like so many parts of the world, right?
07:14Like from U.S. to Europe, and then also Southeast Asia.
07:17And to see, you know, the themes that I'm talking about.
07:21It's a very Malaysian film, and I know when I show it in Southeast Asia,
07:24the Southeast Asians are like, oh, we get it, we see this.
07:27But also to like show it in somewhere like Norway, or even Cannes, you know?
07:31And people are like, I can relate to this character,
07:34who is a young girl from Malaysia, like climbing trees and stuff.
07:38It's amazing that they can relate to it.
07:40And so I think that's been really special.
07:42What are some of the universal themes that you think people connect with there?
07:45Yeah, I mean, for Tiger Stripes, it's really about, it's for people who felt like they had to live up to society's expectations,
07:53or they felt like they were ashamed of their full selves.
07:56And it's to kind of push and fight for that, and to be proud of who you are, and stand tall like a tiger.
08:03Sounds nice.
08:05Mendoop is, I guess Mendoop was very necessary, because it talks about the present,
08:12the present of Saudi Arabia, Riyadh, more specifically, because I lived in Riyadh, the city, for 40 years,
08:20and tell the story about this loner, this guy who delivers food around the city,
08:25and get access to houses and people without being noticed.
08:30But at the same time, I want to do it as a thriller, you know, and genre piece,
08:35and he drives at night, and his lack of sleep, and all of that.
08:39But at the same time, I think it's the marginalized character who is like in the center of the attention of the film.
08:46I wanted to do that, I guess.
08:49We live in this vast world of communication, but loneliness is still there, you know what I mean?
08:55So I wanted to shine light on that subject matter.
08:59So kind of that connects with people, I'm hoping, at least in Saudi, in Riyadh.
09:05That sounds amazing.
09:06Yeah.
09:07Well, for Inshallah, I believe it's a social thriller that is exploring some human rights.
09:18I can say that because it's talking about specific laws in Jordan and in the Middle East,
09:25and in the Arab world that some women might face, and will make some troubles for them to have their own rights,
09:41like home or raising their own children, and in a society that will ask women to have a boy in order for these laws to be different,
09:58to change all the laws upside down.
10:01So, yes, I'm talking about very specific laws in my country maybe, but I was also trying to echo it around the, to have like an echo around the world.
10:15And I noticed that when I was like, again, in Cannes, in Toronto, in Carlo Vivari, and wherever I screened the film,
10:27I felt like the connection, especially from women in the West and around the world, that they feel the character,
10:37and they feel the struggle, but they also can reflect their own struggles in it.
10:43And this is very important for me that it's not only about our area, it's about women rights around the world.
10:51I feel like we still, like in some, in the West, for example, women doesn't have the same salary like men, for example.
11:03What I want to say is that I believe none of us is free until we are all free.
11:09If a woman is struggling in the Middle East, there is an illusion of a freedom in the West for, for, for, for, for women.
11:23Until we are all free, nothing will change.
11:26The stories of women, Kauta, is something that you obviously have experienced.
11:32I did the movie called The Men Who Saw The Skin.
11:35Yeah, yeah, yeah.
11:36Everybody, I'm doing all my movies about them, which is true, but I have...
11:41One man.
11:42One man and all my women movies.
11:45Praise the Lord.
11:48So, about my last movie for daughters, it's a documentary.
11:53I did it, I worked on it, like, for five years.
12:00And I was thinking it's a small documentary, and then it went to Cannes in the main competition.
12:07And we all know that Cannes, they don't like documentaries.
12:10They love pictures.
12:12You have experience like this?
12:13Yeah, yeah.
12:14Yeah.
12:15So, it was like...
12:17And especially in the main competition, because the last movie, I think, was Far Night 9-11, of Michael Moore.
12:23No.
12:24So, this year, they took two documentaries.
12:26I said, yes, finally.
12:27Progress.
12:28It's the revenge of reality.
12:30So, yeah, it was amazing.
12:34And the story, as you said, it's a woman's story.
12:36It's four daughters and their mother.
12:40And in the movie, the real character, since it's a documentary, are directing actors to summon their past to understand it in an almost British theatre.
12:52So, it's a very, how to say, multi-layered device.
13:00And I was worried that nobody will understand.
13:04It's too complicated, you know?
13:06Because you have actors playing absent daughters, and the real daughters, and you have the mother.
13:11And you have another actor playing the mother when it's hard for her to...
13:16So, it's like, I was like, nobody will understand this movie.
13:19And now, I'm realizing, like all of you guys, that, I mean, I have the same feedbacks in Los Angeles, in Jakarta, as you say, in Tunis, here in Saudi Arabia.
13:33Yesterday, we had the premiere here.
13:35So, it's amazing.
13:36I mean, this is why we all love cinema, because it's beyond culture, beyond...
13:43Yeah.
13:44It can be about something very, how to say, in a small village or a small family.
13:50Yeah, yeah.
13:51But it's...
13:53And there's another level, I mean, why we love cinema, especially me, because we feel empathy.
14:02And I think in our world today, we need a lot of empathy, because we live in such a cruel world.
14:08Yeah.
14:09The word empathy, we have selective empathy, we have...
14:13So, that's why telling stories is so important.
14:17And propaganda, understand it.
14:19That's why I think that every movie is important.
14:21I don't know who said that every movie is your own propaganda, and I believe in it, because it translates your point of view.
14:29So, that's why all our propagandas added together can give us a wider vision.
14:36Yeah.
14:37Mm-hmm.
14:38Interesting.
14:39Well said.
14:40There are so many great stories to tell here in the region, right?
14:45And I thought before the festival, oh, I wonder if some people might not travel to the region, because of, you know, the conflict in another part of the Middle East going on.
14:54And then you were one of the people who said, I made a conscious decision to come.
14:59Mm-hmm.
15:00Tell us a little bit about what your thought process was and why you felt it was important to come and come at this time.
15:05Mm-hmm.
15:06I think it's been said much more eloquently, much more to the point than I can say it just then, which is, in a cruel world, in a world of selective empathy, that the most important thing is to double down on storytelling.
15:25Because even if, and you've all mentioned, and I think this was a beautiful thing to hear, your desire to tell stories, because film is just one way of doing it.
15:35Yeah.
15:36It can be theatre, it can be, you tried novel writing, it can be graphic work.
15:40Yeah.
15:41But it came from childhood.
15:44Mm-hmm.
15:45It came from something in your childhood where you just had to get it out.
15:48And as you refer to it as your own personal propaganda, your own personal point of view.
15:52Mm-hmm.
15:53So I thought, just like has been articulated at the table, more than ever, it's not voices.
16:02I mean, where politics and mechanical solutions fail us.
16:07Yeah.
16:08More than ever, the storytelling humanizes.
16:14It brings empathy, because you can talk about a situation, you can talk about it politically, you can go this and that.
16:23Or with statistics, which is worse.
16:26Yes, worse.
16:27Yeah.
16:28But when you see, and I've seen some of the movies that some of you have made, and I have not seen some of the movies, I'm looking forward to them.
16:35But absolutely, they're human beings.
16:38And it doesn't matter whether it's Jordan or Casablanca or, you know, the daughter's one I'm fascinated by, the way that you've mixed.
16:49You know, and I hear what you say about documentaries, but in the end, I watch movies from 12 o'clock at day to 12 o'clock at night.
16:58I've been doing that every single day.
17:00Today I have four movies to watch.
17:01I've never done it before.
17:03But I haven't seen a movie that I haven't had an emotional response to the humanity, the people.
17:10They're people.
17:11And it doesn't matter who they are and where they're from.
17:14And that is so much more powerful than people getting around a table and yelling at each other, you know, with some political agenda.
17:20Oh, yes.
17:21So I thought it was, I thought it was just, not just important to do.
17:28I didn't think there was a choice to back out because I thought, if not now, when, you know?
17:35Yeah, especially what's happening now in the Middle East, I mean, and all the coverage over it, it's more of a necessary for filmmakers to actually present more stories and tell their own voice and own narrative.
17:50Because you feel things are just misconstrued or misrepresented and it's your authentic voice that it's important to know.
17:57Yeah.
17:58And by the way, where is the storytelling?
18:00Not the storytelling.
18:01Yeah.
18:02Because there's a, there's a word that goes, you call media or the news.
18:06There's a world wide web.
18:07There's click bait.
18:08There's la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la.
18:10And to a certain degree, that is storytelling.
18:12It's never the truth.
18:14It's somebody's truth.
18:15Yes.
18:16Unfortunately, somebody's truth is generally motivated now by a machine.
18:22I mean, there's a machine inside that world wide web that goes, if the click bait goes like that.
18:28And it's louder.
18:29Wow.
18:30It's louder, right?
18:31So what I've really been reminded, and I, I don't, I'm not saying I'm retiring.
18:35I'm retiring.
18:36No.
18:37No.
18:38No.
18:39No.
18:40No.
18:41No.
18:42One more.
18:43One more.
18:44But no, in all honesty, you're all young filmmakers and I find it so uplifting.
18:48But I've been locked in a dark room, very, very cold in a good way, wearing a ski jacket in the hottest place in the world.
18:57Yeah.
18:58Yeah.
18:59Because, because I've been looking at these movies so diverse, so different.
19:03Quite often, there's underlying thematics in them that are quite similar.
19:08And what I love about what you guys are doing so far, what I've seen, is that you're blending genres.
19:15So you're taking a serious, serious issue that's very present, but you're also blending it with quite entertaining genre.
19:22And I think that's so smart.
19:23And back in my day, that's something I liked to do, but it wasn't really that well accepted.
19:28You know, it was like, oh, you know, too much confetti.
19:31Yeah.
19:32But just to put a nail in this, the difference between someone who's maybe, and I don't think it's documentary news, who's doing that, and it's set up to an editor and they go like, how do we get our station to get the most noise?
19:48Versus someone who's spent five years with a family telling a story.
19:55Now, it's still going to be your point of view, but you've spent the time to dig into the humanity of it.
20:03Yeah, but that's why when you were talking about media, I think that media installs something like Amnesia, because it's so fast and so…
20:10Yes, correct.
20:11Absolutely.
20:12And that's why we need literature, that's why we need movies, because it's the memory of people, you know?
20:17Yeah.
20:18One thousand percent.
20:19So it's very important to tell our stories.
20:21Yeah.
20:22It's like an obligation almost.
20:23Yeah.
20:24Yeah.
20:25On my shoulder.
20:26Yeah, yeah.
20:27People say, where'd you get your information from?
20:29But it's not really information, because that stuff coming through the tube or through your TV or on your phone like that…
20:34It's becoming a show.
20:35It's a show.
20:36It's a business.
20:37I mean, this is a gigantuan shift in what that mechanic used to be.
20:42That mechanic used to be people who used to go and report.
20:46Report meant gather the information collected to the best of your ability, presented without your presence.
20:54And now it's become, ladies and gentlemen, tonight.
20:57And that is a show.
20:58Well, if it's a show, call it a show.
21:00What I like about drama, or dramatic documentary, with drama, you are saying, it's a big lie.
21:07I've just made this all up.
21:08I mean, I am telling a story.
21:10Yeah.
21:11Right?
21:12It's my story, but I'm telling the big lie to reveal a greater truth.
21:16Yeah.
21:17As opposed to what I see coming, what we see when you say it's a big show, it's not only a big show, it's being presented as the truth.
21:25It's the truth.
21:26Oh, it's so upsetting.
21:27I mean, it's so upsetting.
21:28But you know where does it come from?
21:30Because…
21:31Yes, I do.
21:32You're not American, so…
21:33I'm not American.
21:34No, you're sorry.
21:35I'm Australian.
21:36Yeah.
21:37But actually, I might even be more complicit in that than you think.
21:41Because that revolution started actually…
21:45I mean, I don't want to put out on this table a clickbait that's going to overshadow the very important things that you're all saying.
21:53That's another subject, but I very much know where that started from.
21:56I'll tell you something.
21:57There's a great film that I love from the 1970s called Network.
22:02I love it.
22:03Isn't that great?
22:04Oh my God.
22:05But you know what?
22:06Guys, it was a satire.
22:07Yeah.
22:08And you know, it's an Australian actor who posthumously won Peter Finch.
22:11He won the award for the best Oscar.
22:12Yeah.
22:13Yeah.
22:14And the satire is, imagine a crazy world where there's conflict actually in the Middle East, it's in it, where there's an oil crisis.
22:22And the guy's just a newsreader, and he just reads the news, but he's old.
22:26Yeah.
22:27And it caught to them.
22:28You know, he's got rub, rub, rub, rub the news.
22:30I'm sorry, I have to get rid of you.
22:31You're too boring.
22:32We need someone cooler and hipper.
22:33And he goes mad, and he starts yelling, I'm as mad as I am.
22:37And they go, gee, that's entertaining.
22:39Why don't we make the news entertaining?
22:42Let's make it entertaining.
22:44And this was hilarious and satirical, except today, it's real.
22:49And it's not funny.
22:50He went viral on today's terms.
22:52He absolutely went viral.
22:53He went viral.
22:54And it's just, then it was a joke.
22:56Now it's just, actually, I think it's bordering on, if not an evil, one of the most destructive forces on the planet.
23:05I totally agree.
23:06Exactly.
23:07Yeah.
23:08Yeah.
23:09So the media person here is going to ask a question.
23:12Can you be more to tell me?
23:15I was curious, because we talked, I find it great how you guys all talked about telling your own stories.
23:24And I think, I picked this up from you as well, because you learn so much.
23:28You see something and you say, oh, I wasn't aware of this part of the world.
23:32I wasn't aware of this thinking or of this cultural approach to things.
23:37And I wanted to ask the reverse question.
23:40Like in Hollywood, you sometimes see movies and you see, you know, Muslims or you see people from the Middle East portrayed.
23:45And I sometimes wonder, do you ever watch any of these and go, what, why?
23:51You know, is there anything that ever annoys you always say, this is so wrong or so off.
23:56Can you share any of this with us?
23:57Yeah, I have a shock when I watched one of the, it's a wonderful movie.
24:05It's very well done.
24:08But when you watch it with my eyes from this region, it's Lawrence of Arabia.
24:12I was like, okay, why the protagonist is a white man?
24:21Why are you talking about the Arabian revolution in those terms?
24:24What did happen?
24:26What did the British in this region?
24:29How they promised the Arab something and they went, they did another thing.
24:33And they was mad as hell, you know, like in network.
24:38I mean, it's a great movie.
24:41It had a lot of impact and I was thinking that maybe one day we should tell a story with the protagonist from the Arab revolution, not the second character.
24:51Because again, when you, we all write story around this table, the complexity you give it to the protagonist.
25:00All the sides, you know, the conflict.
25:03When you do a secondary character, it's, you have one aspect, you know.
25:08When you are a marginalized character in your story, you have one side, you have the prejudgment, you have all those cliches things.
25:18So I was, yeah, this was...
25:20Okay.
25:21Can I comment on that just because you happened to pick a film that when I grew up in a very small country town in Australia, we had a gas station and a farm.
25:30But for a moment we ran the local cinema through tragic circumstances, but my father ran the cinema.
25:38And one of the films that came there was Lawrence of Arabia.
25:40And I loved the film.
25:42I thought it was amazing.
25:43It's wonderful.
25:44It's amazing.
25:45But I do want to get to the point you're making, because it's a very, very good point.
25:48I've just had recent experience of it.
25:50What was wonderful about it, it left me this great love of this part of the world.
25:55Now, you're absolutely right, because the film's made in the 60s.
25:58Yeah.
25:59There are worse things in that.
26:01I know.
26:02You didn't touch upon some of these, like Alec Guinness.
26:04Because I love the movie.
26:05I know.
26:06Alec Guinness is a great actor, but he plays King Faisal.
26:09He's an English actor making Faisal.
26:12Okay, you know that's good.
26:13And Anthony Quinn is Mexican.
26:15And I mean, there's some of the worst makeup in cinema on it, right?
26:18Yeah.
26:19But let's just hold it for a moment, because I think what you're really getting at, and
26:23by the way, I love your idea, and you should be the one to do it.
26:26Because the Lawrence story is a fascinating one.
26:29Because I think the gestalt in the movie is that in the end, Lawrence has a messianic complex.
26:35He falls in love with the place.
26:36No.
26:37And all over the West are going like, yeah, yeah, we'll look after you.
26:40We just want to get rid of the Ottomans.
26:41I mean, it's the Ottoman Empire.
26:43They get rid of the Ottomans, and Lawrence thinks he's kind of, he's become, you know,
26:47an Arab leader, and he's mad.
26:49And he goes, right, I've been promised at the Arab League that you're all going to get
26:53a fair, it's going to be, it's going to be handed over, really, to the traditional
26:58owners of the land, and they're double-crossed.
27:01Yeah.
27:02And that leads directly to where we are today.
27:04So on that level, it's great.
27:05But I've just revisited a film I did called Australia, and I just have it on Disney class
27:10called Far Away Downs.
27:12And what I tried to do, whether I was successful or not, was take an old Gone With The Wind-like
27:16movie, like an old melodrama, but flip it and tell it from the point of view of a First
27:22Nations indigenous child who were taken from their families because of mixed race and locked
27:29up in compounds.
27:30And it was totally destructive to the culture, the indigenous culture.
27:34Now I'm not saying I did it right, I did it particularly well, and maybe I'm not the person to do it.
27:39But if Lawrence, Lawrence is a fascinating story, Seven Pillars of Wisdom, great.
27:46He had an amazing relationship with Ali.
27:48Yeah.
27:49So where's the Ali version?
27:50Yeah.
27:51And he goes, and I, by the way, and Ali's alive, and Ali's...
27:55Yeah, that sidekick character, Lawrence, he really let me down.
27:58Yeah.
27:59Yeah.
28:00You know, like, it's your jobs.
28:01Yeah.
28:02Exactly.
28:03You have the power to do it.
28:04Now, by the way, just saying this, I just saw amazing film studios down in Alula,
28:08right, they're waiting for that version of this movie to get to work.
28:11Who was ready to make a Lawrence or Ali movie?
28:16But flip it.
28:17It's about Saudi Arabia, you know, it's about the country.
28:20It is.
28:21But at the same time, I feel like the challenges or the things that we face is putting all the
28:27Middle East in one thing, you know, which is not.
28:29We're not.
28:30We're totally different.
28:31We're like a lot different than...
28:32Of course.
28:33And at the same time, always presenting Saudi as the rich country or the extreme country
28:39or the...
28:40And it's not.
28:41It's our responsibility to say so.
28:43But I do humor a lot in my films.
28:46Just I think humor kind of defuse tension and make your, like, story better if it's
28:54sensitive and it's around things like that.
28:57So I think one of the challenges is breaking stereotypes around your culture.
29:02That's a preconceived notion that people have about it.
29:06But sometimes I ask my question, is it real?
29:09Is it really necessary to think about that just to think about your story?
29:15And if you were honest to your story, that would be the truth, the new truth, you know
29:20what I mean?
29:21Yeah.
29:22Hey, can I ask a quick question?
29:23Yeah.
29:24Because you bring something up.
29:25And it's probably, believe me, it's not something that...
29:29Look, I'm just intrigued by this.
29:31Yeah.
29:32Right.
29:33Because I absolutely agree.
29:34Like, what is going on in this region, and it's a region right now, right?
29:40If you're not from anywhere around here, there's a huge generalization in the West of just
29:45sort of going like, it's one place.
29:47Yeah.
29:48Yeah.
29:49It's all the same.
29:50And it's very annoying.
29:51All right.
29:52It's very annoying.
29:53Of course.
29:54It's annoying.
29:55But do you think...
29:56And by the way, I'm not American.
29:57So we do that too.
29:58Yeah.
29:59It's not that big a deal.
30:03I've gotten over it.
30:05But I do...
30:06I actually live in Australia, in Paris quite a lot.
30:11And we have a place in America too, New York.
30:15So we get around.
30:16We're Australians, we travel.
30:17But do you think also that sometimes there's a generalization that America is just one big
30:24place?
30:25Yeah.
30:26Because people who live in Florida generally might be different from people who live in
30:30New York.
30:31Yeah.
30:32Might be different from people who live in Idaho.
30:33Yeah.
30:34Actually, it's very interesting because it's much easier not to understand the other and
30:39to generalize the idea of a stereotype, like all Arabs look the same, all Americans look
30:46the same, or they act the same.
30:48Or they think the same.
30:49Or they think the same.
30:50And you know what?
30:51In Cannes because this year we have like different Arab films.
30:55So there was like, I don't know if it's a new sentence that people are using, Arab cinema,
31:06which is music to my ears.
31:09Because I have a film from Jordan.
31:12She has a film from Tunisia.
31:13She has a film from Morocco.
31:14She has a film from Saudi.
31:15It's like, yes, collectively we are Arabs, but it's a colorful, very colorful stories.
31:24She has her own way to tell a story from her own culture and background.
31:29Which is, there is a common stuff between us, but it's totally different than Jordan, Tunisia.
31:36And I have my own type of storytelling and my own way to communicate the story with my own background.
31:45And I was trying to reflect my society through these stories.
31:50So what's so interesting with cinema that we are, yes, collectively maybe we are coming from the same region,
31:58but we have definitely different stories, which is, again, magic.
32:03I've seen some of the movies.
32:05I know that to be true.
32:06Yeah.
32:07While some of the things may be central, the diversity and the difference,
32:11it goes back to what you said in the beginning.
32:13As children, you were compelled to tell a story.
32:19Growing up hearing your father or wanting to draw a story or, you know, feeling isolated,
32:25you know, whatever that was, or the cinema, you know.
32:29And then we spend the rest of our lives trying to hang on to that purity, really,
32:35our compulsion to tell them and to keep the way we tell them, ours and individual.
32:41And I do think, back to our friends and, you know, we're talking about where the media is headed
32:47into a showmanship and a showbiz.
32:50It's really useful, the machine, and it really is the machine, gets good clickbait
32:55if it generalises about the Middle East, if it generalises about America.
33:00I mean, to be honest, I was in the Oscar run last year.
33:04It was won by everything, everywhere, all at once.
33:06I loved the movie, right?
33:08There's an Asian-American picture.
33:11When Parasite won Best Picture, amazing.
33:14I've got one expectation I will leave you all with.
33:17Please, before I retire, make sure that a film from the Arab region wins Best Picture.
33:26That is your job.
33:27How?
33:28Yes.
33:29Not just here.
33:30Everybody's ready.
33:31But at the Oscars.
33:32I'll see you guys at the Oscars.
33:33All of us, no?
33:34Yeah.
33:35Sure, why not?
33:36By the way, that's the other really revolutionary, wonderful thing.
33:38It was the two Daniels.
33:39This thing of two directors, collaborative directors, I love it.
33:42Oh my gosh.
33:43Oh my gosh, it was so awesome.
33:44I'm going like, can anyone collaborate with me?
33:46Because I really can't just do it on my own.
33:47Yeah, exactly.
33:48Two of you.
33:49I like the idea that films come from the childhood.
33:53The six years of Raid that they talked about.
33:56And behind the naivety of things we can pass, the very hard things, and the very traumatic
34:02things.
34:03That's why, for me, it's important to ask the first question, where are you in this film?
34:07I'm from Morocco, I'm sure I cannot make films about Tunisia, because it's not my identity.
34:14But we are together, we are talking about Arab cinema.
34:18It's really important to talk about what happened in the six years, the first six years,
34:24because everything comes from me.
34:26It does.
34:27And you know what?
34:28You're kind of, because I can say this with great authority, because I'm the oldest.
34:35You can get lost.
34:37Your language can get lost, because success actually breeds all these sort of baubles
34:42and things.
34:43They're great.
34:44They go, oh, what do you know?
34:45You're going to go to a restaurant.
34:46Oh, that's great.
34:47And then suddenly, once you get that, you're like, hmm, I've got to kind of maintain that.
34:52You know?
34:53How do I, you know?
34:54So you get lost.
34:55But that's all right.
34:56Reborn into that pure initial gesture, I believe.
35:01Yeah.
35:02Having said that, it's, hmm, tonight's news.
35:05That was bad as hell.
35:08Thank you, Baz, for joining us.
35:10Guys, you keep talking.
35:11We'll send you off.
35:12Keep talking, but more importantly, keep telling stories.
35:17Nice meeting you.
35:18Nice to meet you.
35:19Well, I think we can do maybe another couple of rounds.
35:22You can see it when you guys talk about filmmaking.
35:24You guys are so passionate about your work, which is great.
35:27Because that alone already makes me go, oh, now I just want to see this movie more, right?
35:32Because I can see you guys put your heart and your soul in it.
35:35If you guys weren't making movies, what would you do for a living?
35:40Oh, my God.
35:41I don't know.
35:42Raising cats.
35:44Great choice.
35:47This is very beautiful.
35:49Almost poetic.
35:50Yeah.
35:51Almost poetic.
35:52I think that.
35:53I literally don't know, like, what else I could do.
35:57I mean, definitely something involved in storytelling, whether it's, yeah, music or writing.
36:02I think I can't let that go.
36:04I love cinema because I can kind of combine visual with stories, and that's what really excites me.
36:11And there's so many people involved, so much collaboration that I love.
36:15I love working in cinema just because of, you know, that amount of collaboration.
36:20And the minds that you work with, the stories that you're getting, even just from your own
36:25team to create this one thing is so magical and beautiful.
36:29So, I don't know.
36:30If not for a film, yeah, I'll raise cats.
36:32I like this.
36:34I like this.
36:35Yeah?
36:36I love this, yeah.
36:37You guys go work together.
36:38Yeah.
36:39The cat farm.
36:40Yeah.
36:41I love it.
36:42Can we get dogs?
36:43Yeah.
36:44I love it.
36:45I love it.
36:46I love it.
36:47I love it.
36:48To make sure.
36:49Yeah, you're into it.
36:50Yeah.
36:51No, actually, I like the cat project, but...
36:54The project.
36:55Yeah.
36:56It's real.
36:57How do we finance it?
36:59Yeah, yeah, yeah.
37:01Give me the idea.
37:02I think, I think I would be a chef.
37:05Ooh.
37:06A chef?
37:07A chef.
37:08Although I'm very bad with cooking, because I can't follow a recipe.
37:12I like to be creative while doing...
37:14Yeah.
37:15But at the end, it's good.
37:16It's bad.
37:17It's so bad.
37:18Okay.
37:19Oh, yeah.
37:20I still check it out, you know?
37:23But I think if I follow a recipe, once I tried it, like to follow a recipe, it was good.
37:29You're going to join them in the...
37:32I don't know.
37:33I will be a psychiatrist.
37:34What is a psychiatrist?
37:35Psychologist.
37:36Psychologist.
37:37Yeah, because it's in here.
37:39It's in here.
37:40Like, we are making films about trauma.
37:43Well, I mean, we are provoking things.
37:46We will not kill anyone, but finally, it's going to be a therapy for someone.
37:52So, I have no money now for cinema.
37:56I just spend money, but I get no money from cinema.
37:59Yeah.
38:00Okay, all of you.
38:01But one day, if I really give up cinema, I will just start learning how to just listen
38:09to the people, because this is a good job.
38:11Yeah.
38:12I just think, now I feel stupid with that.
38:14Can I repeat?
38:15No, no, no.
38:16The other job is that, like...
38:19Yeah.
38:20I guess I will be a teacher.
38:22Oh.
38:23Because that's...
38:24You stole it from me.
38:25Oh, my God.
38:26Actually.
38:27I don't think of you already.
38:28No.
38:29For me, it's my retirement life.
38:31That was my first job.
38:33Then I...
38:34Like you?
38:35Yeah, yeah.
38:36What did you teach?
38:37Computer science.
38:38Oh.
38:39Yeah.
38:40And I was so awkward with it.
38:42Because I was too young and everybody in the school was a bit older than me.
38:46So I had to, like...
38:47I had to, like, fake a character.
38:50I was acting with them.
38:52Just to get respect, you know what I mean?
38:54Child genius.
38:55Yeah.
38:56Yeah.
38:57But I'll do that in drawing as well, because I love drawing.
39:00So I would do that.
39:01Wow.
39:02And transforming knowledge is really great, you know?
39:05As directors, what they do is mostly as well when they work with the team is talking about,
39:11like, knowledge, you know?
39:12You're passing your knowledge of the film and how you...
39:15It's communication.
39:16So I think that would be a good place to come back to.
39:19Yeah?
39:20Yeah.
39:21For me, I was thinking about teaching because I...
39:24Let's open a school together.
39:26Let's not start it, guys.
39:28Let's not start it, guys.
39:29Let's not start it.
39:30We need to receive our...
39:32This is more serious.
39:34No, it's good.
39:35And then we teach your cats and dogs.
39:37Exactly.
39:38If you have problems, you can come back.
39:40Okay.
39:41We'll do this.
39:42No, but I think that teaching is...
39:45I mean, I was inspired by teachers when I was young.
39:48They give me something very precious that added to my personality.
39:53And I always remember them with a lot of affection because they made me a better person.
40:00So I thought that if I not do cinema, I want to play this role in people's life.
40:07What to teach?
40:08I don't know.
40:09Maybe literature because I love literature.
40:11And it's always about storytelling.
40:13It's about how to see the world.
40:15But this is my retirement plan.
40:17Oh, okay.
40:18I like it.
40:19Let's think about that project, though.
40:21Yeah, sure.
40:22Yeah.
40:23Well, as the final question, one of the things I noticed as a journalist, you always think,
40:28oh, we know what people are interested in.
40:31And then a few years ago, at the end of a conversation, I said to somebody, what's important
40:36to you that we didn't talk about?
40:38And the guy said, I want the whales to be saved.
40:41Oh, okay.
40:42And then we talked about that for a few minutes.
40:44So now I sometimes end by saying to people, you know, what didn't I ask you about that's
40:49important to you that you would like to talk about just because it's something that you
40:53spend time or energy with or something that's close to your heart.
40:56And you never get a chance to talk about it because you always have to talk about the
40:59movies.
41:00If it's nothing, we can just say.
41:02We are really happy to have all of us with the films, achieving the film.
41:07It's not easy.
41:08I mean, yeah.
41:09It's a miracle.
41:10Yeah.
41:11It's, yeah.
41:12For me, it was 10 years working with my family.
41:15I cannot tell that I hate them now because there is camera.
41:21But I hate to watch my films today because it was very dramatic to finish film, not as
41:28a woman or as a man.
41:29It's the same.
41:30The process, how making film is difficult.
41:33So if someone just can't arrive to achieve something, achieve films to show it to the
41:39international level, to arrive to get selected by the country, representing their countries
41:44for the Oscars, it's really nice.
41:47And I hope that one of, I mean, I'm so sorry, but I will talk about Arab films.
41:52I'm coming from Arab countries.
41:55So I hope that one of us just have something.
41:59If there is someone, it will be cultural because she, she did, yeah, she did a lot.
42:07No, but I had, like, you said something not about our films.
42:12Well, it can be.
42:13It's fine.
42:14So I have this nihilist thing.
42:16I'm sorry, guys.
42:18But sometimes when I see what is happening, you know, right now in Gaza, I think that what,
42:25why we are doing all this, you know, it's about ending the life of people.
42:30We are talking about life.
42:31So I get in this nihilist path where nothing looks to me important, you know, we will die
42:40all.
42:41This planet will perish.
42:43Nothing will stay.
42:45I'm sorry to put it this way, but this is my mood those days.
42:48So I'm trying to smile.
42:50I'm trying to present the movie talking, but it's very hard, you know.
42:54Yeah.
42:55So I'm sorry about this.
42:57I understand.
42:58But it's something very difficult, you know.
43:02Yeah.
43:03We live in a tough time.
43:05But hanging to your films and keep telling stories is really important.
43:11I know.
43:12I totally agree.
43:13Yeah.
43:14Like in a time like this, it's like, you know, we were talking about earlier on, but stories
43:18is the way to hopefully, you know, kind of bring people together.
43:23The sad thing is that, like, we need to keep fighting for audience to watch these stories.
43:29That's the problem because this clickbait, like, crap is taking over.
43:33And it's like, I'd love to have more people in the cinema watching stories from everywhere,
43:39from all our mini propagandas, personal propagandas.
43:42Because that's, I don't know, it helps me a lot, you know.
43:45It helps people who actually do listen to stories, like listen to people, listen to others
43:50and not the loud voice that's dominating everything.
43:54Yeah.
43:55And it's our duty to have, through all the violence and stuff, to actually own our narrative,
44:01you know, own our narrative.
44:03Because there is so much stories and misleading stuff and lies spread around.
44:10It's very valid for us and important for us to keep telling these stories.
44:15Because that's a duty, I guess.
44:18But that's it, that's what I'm...
44:21Should we leave it at that?
44:25Thank you for having us.
44:26Thanks for having us.
44:28Thank you so much.
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