Emirati Filmmakers on Building a Local Cinema Ecosystem: ‘We Have a Long Way to Go’

Emirati Filmmakers on Building a Local Cinema Ecosystem: ‘We Have a Long Way to Go’ hakkında magazin dünyasında yaşanan en son ayrıntılar ve sıcak gelişmeler netleşti. Oct 30, 2026 7:58am PT Emirati Filmmakers on Building a Local Cinema Ecosystem: ‘We Have a Long Way to Go’ By Essie Assibu Plus Icon Essie Assibu Latest Sharjah Film Festival Partners With UAE’s Media Authority in Push to Assist Emerging Filmmakers 4 days ago Egyptian Cinema Eyes Its Next Act as Industry Veterans Call for Better Scripts, Wider Distribution 5 days ago El Gouna Takeaways: ‘Safe Exit’ Wins Top Prize, Arab TV Seeks New Talent and Egyptian Filmmakers Push Boundaries 6 days ago See All Add us as a Google Preferred Source Comments Two Emirati filmmakers are bringing distinctly local stories to the 13th edition of the Sharjah Intl. Film Festival for Children and Youth, with Khalid Al Mahmood ’s musical “The Mangrove House” and Abdulrahman Al Madani ’s family drama “Oug,” the only Emirati films in competition.

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Both filmmakers have longstanding ties to SIFF. “The Mangrove House,” which world premiered as the festival’s opening film, was pitched at SIFF’s inaugural Film Pitching Session last year as Al Mahmood was seeking post-production support.

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FANN – Media Discovery Platform, SIFF’s parent organization, subsequently came aboard to back the film. For Al Madani, “Oug” marks the third film he has screened at the festival, following “Nagafa,” which played at SIFF in 2015, and “Laymoon” in 2019.

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in 1999, recalls returning to a UAE where filmmaking was virtually nonexistent, just as an early community of filmmakers was beginning to take shape. Annual screenings of locally made films, which later took shape as the Emirates Film Competition, became “a school where we came together and critiqued our films,” he explains.

“More and more festivals popped up,” including the Dubai Intl. Film Festival and Abu Dhabi Film Festival.

Al Madani entered the industry shortly before much of that festival ecosystem disappeared and remembers the “privilege” of having an abundance of platforms before “the plug was pulled, and then we didn’t know where to go next.” Abu Dhabi Film Festival remains defunct, while Dubai, which held its last edition in 2017, is set to return in December 2027. The loss pushed Al Madani and many Emirati filmmakers of his generation beyond the UAE.

In the decade that followed, he made shorts that traveled internationally, an experience he describes as a “wake-up call” that taught him not to solely rely on platforms at home. Institutional support across the emirates is now growing.

“Oug” received a grant from the UAE Ministry of Culture, a significant shift from a period Al Madani describes as having virtually “zero support.” “We have a long way to go, but I think this is a good start,” he acknowledges. “People feel like they can go and apply somewhere [local] to get funding.” For Al Mahmood, however, much of the UAE’s film infrastructure remains geared toward attracting international productions rather than sustaining local filmmakers.

“What’s missing to me is just the infrastructure to be able to make films in th

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