The Arab world’s representatives at Cannes Film Festival

The features from Arab filmmakers showing at the movie industry’s most prestigious event this year

‘Norah’

Starring: Yaqoub Alfarhan,

Maria Bahrawi

Director: Tawfik Alzaidi

Last year, the Saudi-backed “Jeanne du Barry” opened the festival. This year, the Kingdom’s burgeoning film industry takes an even more significant step forward on the global stage with “Norah,” the debut feature from Saudi filmmaker Tawfik Alzaidi (pictured above), which will screen in the festival’s Un Certain Regard section (for “films with unusual styles and non-traditional stories seeking international recognition”). “Norah” is set in AlUla in the late ‘90s and follows a teacher named Nader (Yaqoub Alfarhan), whose ambitions of becoming an artist himself are fading. But when he meets Norah (Maria Bahrawi, pictured), a talented young girl, he does his best to help her make the most of her artistic abilities, in the hope that her country may one day embrace her self-expression.

Speaking to Arab News in November, Alzaidi said: “People always say to me that this movie contains one thing above all else: the truth. I am so happy that our truth can now be told.” He added: “When audiences of the next generation see this film, I want them to remember one thing: Believe in yourself. And if you have a voice, never stop fighting for it.”