The view from the Middle East
▶ Regional content in Netflix programming is sporadic but gems are shining through, writes Chris Newbould
Netflix is yet to produce its first original show in the region, but there are plenty of viewing options with a local link if you take time to search.
Ironically, compared to the United States’ streaming site, there are fewer Middle East-themed shows available to subscribers, in part due to licensing issues with regional distributors and scheduling. Some films such as Oscar-winner Omar and Sundance and Emmy award-winning Five Broken Cameras are unavailable.
But if you want to keep things local, here’s our pick of the best Middle East content.
Salam Neighbour
Salam Neighbour (2016) documents the experiences of US filmmakers Zach Ingrasci and Chris Temple when they lived among 85,000 Syrian refugees in Jordan’s Za’atari camp, seven miles from the Syrian border. The filmmakers, thought to be the first allowed by the UN to set-up a tent in a refugee camp, spent a month in Za’atari to cover what its Refugee Agency calls “the world’s most pressing humanitarian crisis”.
Sand Storm
This drama follows the day-today tribulations of a Bedouin family struggling between conservative traditions and the rapidly evolving modern world. Daughter Layla is allowed a mobile phone and driving lessons, but a boyfriend is a step too far for father Suliman, who has planned her arranged marriage. Meanwhile, Layla’s mother Jalila is resentful of her husband’s second wife. Essentially melodrama with a feminist undercurrent. Sand Storm picked up the Grand Jury Prize at 2016’s Sundance Film Festival.
War Machine
David Michôd’s Afghan War satire, starring Brad Pitt and shot in Abu Dhabi and Ras Al Khaimah, needs little introduction. The cast and crew spent more than a month here in late 2015, shooting with more than 2,000 local extras and the film was streamed in May. If you haven’t watched it yet, you should. There are no Furious 7-style lingering shots of Abu Dhabi’s famous landmarks but there’s plenty of dark humour and a depressingly accurate critique of the never-ending Afghan conflict.
Zinzana
Zinzana is the first UAE-produced film to be picked up by Netflix, which is at least a start until it produces some of its own. Directed by Image Nation Abu Dhabi stalwart Majid Al Ansari, it stars Palestinian actor Ali Suleiman, also of Lone Survivor and Homeland fame. The movie is a taut psychological thriller, carried by a wicked performance from Suleiman as the last police officer you want to find yourself locked in a remote jail with.
Under the Shadow
Babak Anvari’s Farsi language horror film comes with UAE co-production credits, thanks to Dubai-based producer Lucan Toh and his London/Dubaibased Wigwam Films. Set in war-torn Tehran and filmed in Jordan, Under the Shadow was the British entry for this year’s foreign language Oscar, and is nothing if not culturally diverse. It’s also a great watch with genuine scares, as Narges Rashidi’s Shideh is tormented by a djinn that has arrived via an unexploded missile in her roof. The film, along with Zinzana and Ali F Mostafa’s more recent The Worthy, shows how the region is becoming an efficient hub for genre movie production.
The White Helmets
Orlando von Einsiedel’s film about the work of the Syria Civil Defence volunteers, known as the White Helmets, who rescue victims of the civil war, won Netflix its first Oscar, for Best Short Documentary, though Syrian cinematographer Khaled Khatib, himself a White Helmet, was refused entry to the US to attend this year’s Academy Awards ceremony. Khatib said in a statement issued by White Helmets founder Raed Saleh: “I am absolutely delighted that we won an Oscar – it shows that people care about us and the people we serve. This award is for all the volunteers of the White Helmets and all people around the world who are working for peace.”