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Co-presented by Queer Women of Color Media Arts Project, GLAAD & Arab American National Museum
find yourself through forming connections with others. The The The The The This year's Queer Lens program highlights the importance of relationships and community building for young LGBTQ+ Arabs. Featuring a diverse set of award-winning shorts from the Levant, North Africa, and the diaspora, each of these films contend with what it means to find yourself through forming connections with others. The filmmakers explore how Queer Arab youth seek out one another across space and time: by connecting across countries, finding solace in older generations, or through exploring hidden queer narratives in Arab history. Despite the obstacles of social stigma, physical distance, and historical distortion, Queer Arabs remain steadfast in their efforts to establish a community of acceptance and understanding with and for each other.
Mona, a young woman in London, finds archived photographs of Arab women cross-dressing in the 1920s. Somewhere between her fantasies and her reality, she starts a feverish journey of uncovering lost histories and her own identity.
Through a coming-of-age narrative, the film explores the euphoric relationship those who are marginalized create with images and symbols, and how archive images can be a portal for the world of inner projections, creating meaning and grounding one's identity.
Festivals & Awards: BFI Flare, MIX CPH, Encounters Film Festival, Safar FIlm Festival, MENA Film Festival, Runner Up - Best UK Short at London Short Film Festival 2024
About the Filmmaker:
May Ziadé is a London-based French-Lebanese filmmaker, filmworker and the co- founder of Other People’s Films – a production company that produces and creates bridges between moving image work and ‘conventional’ cinema that plays with form. Her work currently focuses on the emotional and physical unfoldings of the societal and cultural pressures to conform. Her latest short film, NEO NAHDA, tells the story of a young Arab woman in London who becomes obsessed with archive images of women cross-dressing in the Middle East in the 1920s. Since its release in March 2023, it has screened globally including as part of the BFI Flare, MIX CPH, Encounters Film Festival, Safar Film Festival, MENA FF,, and has won a runner-up prize for BEST UK SHORT at the London Short Film Festival in 2024.
- Year2023
- Runtime12 minutes
- LanguageEnglish
- CountryUK, Lebanon
- PremiereSan Francisco Premiere
- GenreExperimental, LGBTQ+
- Subtitle LanguageEnglish
- DirectorMay Ziade
Co-presented by Queer Women of Color Media Arts Project, GLAAD & Arab American National Museum
find yourself through forming connections with others. The The The The The This year's Queer Lens program highlights the importance of relationships and community building for young LGBTQ+ Arabs. Featuring a diverse set of award-winning shorts from the Levant, North Africa, and the diaspora, each of these films contend with what it means to find yourself through forming connections with others. The filmmakers explore how Queer Arab youth seek out one another across space and time: by connecting across countries, finding solace in older generations, or through exploring hidden queer narratives in Arab history. Despite the obstacles of social stigma, physical distance, and historical distortion, Queer Arabs remain steadfast in their efforts to establish a community of acceptance and understanding with and for each other.
Mona, a young woman in London, finds archived photographs of Arab women cross-dressing in the 1920s. Somewhere between her fantasies and her reality, she starts a feverish journey of uncovering lost histories and her own identity.
Through a coming-of-age narrative, the film explores the euphoric relationship those who are marginalized create with images and symbols, and how archive images can be a portal for the world of inner projections, creating meaning and grounding one's identity.
Festivals & Awards: BFI Flare, MIX CPH, Encounters Film Festival, Safar FIlm Festival, MENA Film Festival, Runner Up - Best UK Short at London Short Film Festival 2024
About the Filmmaker:
May Ziadé is a London-based French-Lebanese filmmaker, filmworker and the co- founder of Other People’s Films – a production company that produces and creates bridges between moving image work and ‘conventional’ cinema that plays with form. Her work currently focuses on the emotional and physical unfoldings of the societal and cultural pressures to conform. Her latest short film, NEO NAHDA, tells the story of a young Arab woman in London who becomes obsessed with archive images of women cross-dressing in the Middle East in the 1920s. Since its release in March 2023, it has screened globally including as part of the BFI Flare, MIX CPH, Encounters Film Festival, Safar Film Festival, MENA FF,, and has won a runner-up prize for BEST UK SHORT at the London Short Film Festival in 2024.
- Year2023
- Runtime12 minutes
- LanguageEnglish
- CountryUK, Lebanon
- PremiereSan Francisco Premiere
- GenreExperimental, LGBTQ+
- Subtitle LanguageEnglish
- DirectorMay Ziade