Saudi Arabia’s creative and film industry is bursting at the seams with talent, and with the kingdom’s investment in Saudi film projects, it doesn’t come as a surprise that talented, emerging Saudi filmmakers and their projects have been picked up by none other than streaming giant, Netflix. The platform has launched a specially curated collection of 11 short films entitled, “New Saudi Voices.”
The kingdom’s talent is being celebrated on an international level with this curation of films that span a variety of genres including horror, fantasy, family adventure, drama, animation, sci-fi, and non-fiction. Some of the films you can watch are Mohamed Basalamah’s “Hallucinated” which is about a deliveryman who suffers from insomnia which results in hism not being able to differentiate between reality and his hallucinations; “The Day I Lost Myself” by Rami Alzayer is another must-watch title which explores how a man with anxiety finds himself stuck in an elevator on his way to an interview. Documentaries are also part of the collection and include “Arufea” by Abbas Alshuwayfie, “Covida the 19th” by Omar Al Omirat, and short films such as “Whisper Down the Lane” by Raghad Albarqi, “The Jakar” by Abdulaziz Saleh, “The Palm Witch” by Hala Alhaid, “Hide and Seek” by Mohammad Helal, “Red Circle” by Abdulaziz Sarhan, and “Little Bird” by Khalid Fahad.
Nuha el Tayeb, director of content acquisitions, Netflix, MENA, and Turkey said in a statement about the new Saudi Netflix collection, “We’re very excited to amplify the voices of up-and-coming filmmakers in Saudi Arabia through this collection. There’s incredible talent in the Kingdom, and they have unique stories to tell. We hope that as people tune into the films, they learn more about these creators, and catch a glimpse of their passion, originality, and creativity, as we have.”
Each of these films were also a part of New Saudi/New Cinema Shorts that were screened at Saudi Arabia’s inaugural Red Sea Film Festival in Jeddah in 2021. The curation of Saudi films offers viewers to discover emerging film talent from the kingdom via stories that are both nostalgic, an insight into Saudi culture and even an imaginative version of the 2090s.
