Hayat is a superstitious artist convinced she will die the night she turns 30 — just as her mother and grandmother did before her. Youssef is an introverted heart surgeon with bradycardia, a condition that slows his heartbeat to a dangerous crawl.

The only thing that raises his pulse is holding a scalpel. He has the urge to take a life. Hayat wants to die on her own terms. Fate brings them together — and then love gets in the way.

Source: Press kit

RT: 118 mins.

Director: ANAS BA-TAHAF

A sweeping love story spanning three decades. In Lebanon — a country cycling between prosperity and devastation — Nino and Yasmina are drawn together by a magnetic bond. As wars, collapse, and the August 4th explosion reshape the world around them, they face an impossible question: can you build a family and chart a path to happiness in a country that may never let you?

Awards:

. People's Choice Award, Giornate degli Autori (Venice) 2025

· Best Screenplay, Red Sea International Film Festival

· Best Picture, Asian World Fil.m Festival

· Jury Award + Best Acting Feature Film, Hollywood Arab Film Festival 2026

· Aurora Award, Tromsø International Film Festival

· Official Selection: Palm Springs IFF 2026

· San Francisco IFF 2026 · Mostra Internacional de Cinema São Paulo

· Official Selection of Lebanon, 98th Academy Awards®

RT: 109 mins.

Director: CYRIL ARIS

Bouchra is a 35-year-old Moroccan filmmaker living in New York, paralyzed by the blank page. A phone call with her mother in Casablanca shakes loose a flood of memories — and a creative breakthrough. What follows is a journey through family bonds, daughterhood, and the thrill of new love, told entirely through 3D-animated anthropomorphic animals against live-action backgrounds.

Source: Press kit

RT: 82 mins.

Directors: ORIAN BARKI & MERIEM BENNANI

María Ángeles is a 79-year-old Spanish woman who has lived her entire life in Tangier. She has her routines, her neighborhood, her friends — and no intention of going anywhere.

When her daughter arrives from Madrid to sell the apartment, determined to uproot her, María Ángeles fights back with everything she has. And in the process, unexpectedly rediscovers love and sensuality.

Source: Press kit

Awards:

• 82nd Venice Film Festival: Audience Award, Spotlight section

• Toronto International Film Festival 2025: Official Selection

• Morocco's official entry for the 98th Academy Awards, Best International Feature Film

RT: 116 mins.

Director: MARYAM TOUZANI

In a cotton-farming village in Sudan, teenage Nafisa is raised on heroic tales of resistance against British colonizers, passed down by her grandmother Al-Sit, the village matriarch. When a young businessman arrives with a new development plan and genetically engineered cotton, Nafisa becomes the center of a power struggle over the village's future. Awakening to her own strength, she sets out to save the cotton fields — and herself.

Awards/Festivals: World Premiere, Venice International Film Critics' Week 2025 · Golden Alexander (top prize), Thessaloniki International Film Festival · Prix ArteKino International (development award, Cannes 2022)

RT: 93 mins.

Director: SUZANNAH MIRGHANI

A love letter to Beirut — playful, personal, and built entirely from archival footage. Drawing on 70 years of Lebanese film, television, home videos, and photography, Do You Love Me reconstructs a fragmented history in a country without a national archive. Through the eyes of citizens, filmmakers, and artists, it explores the Lebanese collective psyche: its joy and intimacy, its destruction and loss, its enduring creative spirit.

Source: Press kit

Awards:

• Hamburg Film Festival 2025: Political Film Award of the Friedrich-Ebert-Stiftung

• Doclisboa 2025: Honorable Mention — "a poetic film in a form we have never seen before"

• Cinemed 2025: Special Mention

• DocPoint Helsinki Documentary Film Festival 2026: Best Film in International Competition

Festival circuit: Venice (Giornate degli Autori, world premiere) · IDFA · SXSW · CPH:DOX · Marrakech · Cairo · Göteborg · New Directors/New Films

RT: 75 mins.

Director: LANA DAHER

From a small Nile Delta village where as a girl she sang disguised as a boy, to her final concert as a woman battling illness — El Sett traces seven decades in the life of Umm Kulthum (1904–1975), the Egyptian singer who became the Voice of the Arab World.

Starring Mona Zaki in a career-defining performance, the film follows her journey from provincial obscurity to Paris, Cairo concert halls, and global legend — a woman whose voice Bob Dylan, Maria Callas, and Robert Plant all claimed as an influence.

Source: Press kit

Date:(insert screening date)

RT: 155 mins.

Director: MARWAN HAMED

Toha is an eight-year-old child maid working for a wealthy Cairo family.

When her best friend Nelly — the employer's daughter — is about to have a birthday party, Toha goes to extraordinary lengths to make sure it happens, in exchange for a candle to make a wish of her own.

Caught between two irreconcilable worlds, she slowly begins to understand the class divide that will define her life.

Source: Press kit

Awards:

• Tribeca Film Festival 2025: Best International Narrative Feature; Best International Script; Nora Ephron Award (distinguished female filmmaker)

• El Gouna Film Festival 2025: Cinema for Humanity Audience Award

• Heartland International Film Festival 2025: Grand Prize Winner

• São Paulo International Film Festival (49ª Mostra) 2025: Best Performance

• Madrid Films by Women 2025: Best International Film

• Palm Springs International Film Festival 2026: Best International First Feature

• Variety: listed Sarah Goher in "Top 10 Directors to Watch in 2026" (December 2025)

RT: 91 minutes

Director: SARAH GOHER

Saudi Arabia, 2001. Twelve-year-old Janna is traveling with her strict grandmother Sitti and rebellious older sister Sarah from the south of the country to Mecca for the Hajj pilgrimage. When Sarah suddenly vanishes without a trace, Janna and Sitti are forced to continue northward across the Kingdom in a desperate search — crossing ancient pilgrimage routes, meeting strangers, and discovering far more than they bargained for.

Source: Press kit

Awards:

• 82nd Venice Film Festival: Official Selection, Venezia Spotlight; Best Asian Film Award

• Carthage Film Festival (JCC): Best Cinematography Award; Best Actor Award

• Red Sea International Film Festival: Jury Award; Audience Award — Best Saudi Film

• 98th Academy Awards: Saudi Arabia's official entry for Best International Feature Film

RT: 105 mins.

Director: SHAHAD AMEEN

Iraq, 1990s. Nine-year-old Lamia has been chosen by her school to bake a cake for the President's birthday. In a country ground down by sanctions and fear, even eggs, flour, and sugar are nearly impossible to find. Accompanied by her grandmother, her loyal friend Saeed, and her pet rooster Hindi, Lamia sets off on a determined journey through the city to track down the ingredients — navigating vendors, checkpoints, and the daily contradictions of life under Saddam.

Source: Press kit

Awards:

• Cannes Film Festival 2025: Caméra d'Or (best debut feature); Quinzaine des Cinéastes Audience Award

• Iraq's official entry for the 98th Academy Awards, Best International Feature Film

Distributor: Sony Pictures Classics

RT: 105 mins.

Director: HASAN HADI

Egypt, summer 1967. As war looms, Ahmed — a young man from a humble Cairo family — receives a letter from Austria. Liz has replied to his search for a pen pal. From that moment, their long-distance friendship becomes the thread that pulls Ahmed toward an unlikely dream: becoming a concert pianist. Together they live through war, family upheaval, and the tectonic shifts that rocked Egypt from Nasser to the 1980s. The Stories is a chronicle of ordinary people navigating history they never asked for.

Source: Press kit

RT: 101 mins.

Director: ABU BAKR SHAWKY

January 29, 2024. Red Crescent volunteers receive an emergency call. A six-year-old girl is trapped in a car under fire in Gaza, pleading for rescue. While trying to keep her on the line, they do everything they can to get an ambulance to her. Her name was Hind Rajab.

The voices on the phone are real.

Source: Palestine Red Crescent Society

Awards:

• 82nd Venice Film Festival: Grand Jury Prize; nominated for Golden Lion

• 98th Academy Awards:Tunisian entry for Best International Feature Film

• 73rd San Sebastián International Film Festival: Perlak section — audience score 9.52/10

RT: 89 mins.

Director: KAOUTHER BEN HANIA

Shahad Ameen is an award-winning writer and director from Jeddah, Saudi Arabia. She holds a BA in Video Production and Film Studies from the University of West London.

Her short films include Leila's Window (2011), which won Best Film at the Saudi Film Festival, and Eye & Mermaid (2013), which screened in both Toronto and Stockholm. Her debut feature, Scales, premiered at Venice Critics' Week in 2019, won the Verona Film Club Award, and was Saudi Arabia's official submission to the 2020 Academy Awards.

Hijra, her second feature, was three years in the making, shot across nine locations throughout the Kingdom — from AlUla to Tabuk.

HIJRA:

Filmography: Scales (2019) · Hijra (2025)

• Variety review: https://variety.com/2025/film/reviews/hijra-review-1236599962/

• Variety interview with Shahad Ameen: https://variety.com/2025/film/global/shahad-ameen-road-movie-hijra-red-sea-1236601964/

• Screen Daily review: https://www.screendaily.com/reviews/hijra-review-family-bonds-are-tested-when-a-teenage-girl-vanishes-in-accomplished-saudi-drama/5208346.article

Lebanese writer-director Cyril Aris made his fiction feature debut with A Sad and Beautiful World (2025), drawing on his own experience growing up in Lebanon during the turbulent 1990s and early 2000s. His previous documentary Dancing on the Edge of a Volcano (2023) was supported by the Sundance Institute. It premiered in the main competition at Karlovy Vary and won a Special Jury mention, going on to screen at BFI, CPH DOX, DOC NYC, and over 80 festivals worldwide. His feature documentary, The Swing screened at ANA in 2019. His short film The President's Visit (2017) premiered at TIFF and played in over 100 festivals. He holds an MFA from Columbia University and is a member of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences.

Link to film page: A Sad and Beautiful World

Filmography: A Sad and Beautiful World (2025) · Dancing on the Edge of a Volcano (2023) · Beating Hearts (2020) · The Swing (2018) · The President's Visit (2017) · Siham (2013)

Photo Credit © GABRIEL RENAULT

Anas Ba-Tahaf is a filmmaker, producer, writer and editor born and based in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia. During his school years he directed several YouTube series that accumulated over 30 million views. Straight out of high school, he worked on Barakah Meets Barakah — Saudi Arabia's official Oscar submission for 2017 — as co-producer, editor, and first AD.

He subsequently produced Amra and the Second Marriage before writing and directing his debut feature, Fay's Palette, which premiered at the Red Sea International Film Festival in 2021. In television, he directed the Saudi episode of Shahid's anthology series Nemra 2, before showrunning and directing the acclaimed commercial series Jameel Jeddan.

A Matter of Life and Death is his second feature.

Link to film page: A Matter of Life and Death

Kaouther Ben Hania is a Tunisian filmmaker known for work that constantly pushes at the boundary between documentary and fiction. Her second feature, Beauty and the Dogs, premiered in Cannes within Un Certain Regard. Her next, Four Daughters, was nominated for the Best Documentary Oscar at the 2024 Academy Awards after premiering in competition at Cannes. Her previous feature, The Man Who Sold His Skin, represented Tunisia at the 2021 Academy Awards for Best International Feature Film. Both Beauty and the Dogs and The Man Who Sold His Skin showed at ANA.

The Voice of Hind Rajab is her sixth film. Her earlier features have premiered at Cannes, Venice, Locarno, AFI, IDFA, and Hot Docs Toronto.

Film page: The Voice of Hind Rajab

Filmography: The Challat of Tunis (2014) · Zaineb Hates the Snow (2016) · Beauty and the Dogs (2017) · The Man Who Sold His Skin (2020) · Four Daughters (2023) · The Voice of Hind Rajab (2025)

Roger Ebert site : https://www.rogerebert.com/reviews/the-voice-of-hind-rajab-film-review-2025

Photo credit: © Ammar Abd Rabbo

Meriem Bennani (b. 1988, Rabat) lives and works in Brooklyn. A multi-disciplinary artist working across film, sculpture, and immersive installation, her work has been shown at the Whitney Biennale, MoMA PS1, the Guggenheim, Art Dubai, the Vuitton Foundation in Paris, and Fondazione Prada in Milan. Her films have screened at the New York Film Festival, Toronto, and Metrograph, and are available on the Criterion Channel.

Orian Barki (b. 1985, Tel Aviv) lives and works in New York. A documentary filmmaker and director, her work has appeared on ESPN, PBS, Fader, Vogue, Nowness, Le Cinema Club, and Dazed Magazine.

Together, their animated series 2 Lizards premiered on Instagram in Spring 2020. The New York Times described it as "hypnotic… deploying a blend of documentary structure and animation surrealism." The series was acquired by MoMA and the Whitney Museum for their permanent collections. Bouchra is their debut feature, produced by Fondazione Prada.

Link to film page: Bouchra

Filmography: Orian Barki: 2 Lizards (2020) · Rico Nasty (2019) · Destiny (2016) · Shooting Days (2008) Meriem Bennani: Cursed Objects (2022) · Life on the Caps: Trilogy (2018–2022) · 2 Lizards (2020) · Siham & Hafida (2017) · Ghariba (2017) · FLY (2016) · Gradual Kingdom (2015–2016)

Lana Daher is a filmmaker and multi-disciplinary artist based in Beirut. She holds a BFA in Fine Arts and Graphic Design from the American University of Beirut, and an MA in Filmmaking from Goldsmiths, University of London.

Long active in Beirut's art and music scenes, her work moves across sound, image, and archival practice, exploring the space between documentary and fiction.

An IDFAcademy alumna, she co-produced Do You Love Me through her own company, My Little Films, founded in 2024. Alongside the film, she built a companion website — a curated index of the archival materials behind the project, aimed at reconnecting Lebanese film heritage with local and wider audiences.

Do You Love Me is her debut feature.

Link to film page: Do You Love Me

Website:www.doyouloveme.film

Photo: © Sami Sorasalmi

Sarah Goher is an Egyptian-American writer and director, born and raised in the South Bronx. An alumna of NYU Tisch and the Nightingale Bamford School, she worked as a producer on Mohamed Diab’s Cairo 678 (2010), Clash (2016), Amira (2021), and a producer/writer on Marvel Studios' Moon Knight (2022) before making her directorial debut. Cairo 678, Clash and Amira were all shown at ANA.

Happy Birthday premiered at the 2025 Tribeca Festival, where Goher won three awards: Best International Feature, Best International Screenplay, and the Nora Ephron Award for a distinguished female filmmaker. In December 2025, Variety named her one of the top ten directors to watch in 2026.

Link to film page: Happy Birthday

Hasan Hadi is an Iraqi writer-director who grew up in southern Iraq during wartime. He later worked in journalism and production before joining NYU's Graduate Film Program as an adjunct professor.

A 2022 Sundance Lab Fellow, he received the Gotham-Marcie Bloom Fellowship, the Black Family Production Prize, the Sloan Foundation Production Award, the Sundance/NHK Award, the SFFILM Rainin Grant, and a Doha Film Institute Grant — all for The President's Cake, his debut feature.

The film won the Caméra d'Or at Cannes 2025, making it the first Iraqi film ever to win the prize. It is also the first Iraqi film to depict the 1990s Saddam era.

Link to film page: The President's Cake

Egyptian filmmaker Marwan Hamed began his career with the short film Lilly (2001), which won several international awards including the Grand Prix du Public in Clermont-Ferrand and the Golden Tanit in Carthage.

His feature debut, The Yacoubian Building (2006), adapted from Alaa Al-Aswany's best-selling novel, premiered at the Berlin International Film Festival and was distributed internationally to great success.

He has since directed a string of Egyptian box office hits, including The Blue Elephant (2014) and Kira & El Gin (2022).

He has served on juries at the Red Sea, El Gouna, Cairo, and Marrakech film festivals, and received the Career Achievement Award at the El Gouna Film Festival. El Sett is his most ambitious film to date.

Link to film page: El Sett

• Screen Daily : https://www.screendaily.com/reviews/el-sett-review-reverential-heavy-handed-biopic-of-egyptian-singer-umm-kulthum/5211589.article — "The Lady" describes Umm Kulthum as a cross between Edith Piaf, Aretha Franklin, and Maria Callas Screen Daily

• Raseef22 : https://raseef22.net/english/article/1101479-el-sett-review-coopting-the-life-of-an-arab-icon-for-sociopolitical-propaganda

• Yabiladi : https://en.yabiladi.com/articles/details/182715/sett-marwan-hamed-s-bold-reimagining.html

Sudanese-Russian filmmaker Suzannah Mirghani is an Editor/Assistant Director for Publications at the Center for International and Regional Studies (CIRS), Georgetown University in Qatar. She is the first Sudanese woman to write and direct a full-length narrative feature film. Her short film Al-Sit (2020) — the proof-of-concept for Cotton Queen — is on Netflix Middle East and won the Canal+ Award at Clermont-Ferrand. Her short Kamala Ibrahim Ishag: States of Oneness (2022) was commissioned by Serpentine Galleries. 

Cotton Queen premiered at Venice and won the top prize at Thessaloniki.

Afrocritik

Link to film page: Cotton Queen

Filmography: Cotton Queen (2025) · Kamala Ibrahim Ishag: States of Oneness (2022) · Virtual Voice (2021) · Al-Sit (2020) · Caravan (2016) · Hind's Dream (2014)

• Cineuropa : https://cineuropa.org/en/newsdetail/483019/

• Eye for Filmhttp://www.eyeforfilm.co.uk/review/cotton-queen-2025-film-review-by-amber-wilkinson

• Afrocritik : https://afrocritik.com/suzannah-mirghani-cotton-queen-review-s16-film-festival-2025/

Abu Bakr Shawky is an Egyptian-Austrian filmmaker. He studied Political Science in Cairo and earned an MFA in Film Production from NYU's Tisch School of the Arts. His debut feature Yomeddine premiered in Main Competition at Cannes and was nominated for the Palme d'Or, receiving the François Chalais Award. It was Egypt's official submission to the 91st Academy Awards. His second feature, Hajjan, premiered at Toronto and had its Middle Eastern premiere at the Red Sea Film Festival. Variety named him MENA Talent of the Year; Forbes listed him among the top five Arab directors on the global stage. Both Yomeddine and Hajjan were screened at ANA.

The Stories is his third feature.

Link to film page: The Stories

Filmography: Yomeddine (2018) · Hajjan (2023) · The Stories (2025)

Maryam Touzani was born in Tangier. After co-writing Razzia with Nabil Ayouch — in which she also starred — she directed her debut feature Adam, selected at Cannes (Un Certain Regard) and Morocco's official Oscar submission.

In 2022, her second feature The Blue Caftan was selected at Cannes and became the first Moroccan film ever shortlisted for the Academy Award for Best International Feature Film. It won over 60 awards worldwide and set a box office record for a Moroccan film internationally. Both Adam and The Blue Caftan were screened by ANA.

In 2023, she served on the Official Competition jury at Cannes.

Calle Malaga, her third feature, marks her Spanish-language debut. Shot in Tangier — the city where she grew up alongside the last generation of the Spanish community — it stars Carmen Maura in the lead role.

Link to film page: Calle Malaga

Photo: © Lorenzo Salemi