Clean Bandit to perform live in Jeddah as part of Saudi Grand Prix

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Updated 16 March 2022
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Clean Bandit to perform live in Jeddah as part of Saudi Grand Prix

  • The concert will take place on the main stage of the Jeddah Corniche Circuit

JEDDAH: The pop fusion music group Clean Bandit will thrill fans in Jeddah with an evening of hits at the post-race concert on Sunday March 27 to close the second successive Formula One race weekend for the Saudi Grand Prix.

The British band will headline the concert series alongside multi-award-winning DJ and producer, R3HAB, to add to a superstar line-up that will keep fans’ adrenaline flowing long into the Jeddah night after the world’s greatest drivers have crossed the finish line.

The concert will take place on the main stage of the Jeddah Corniche Circuit, F1’s newest, longest and fastest street circuit, right after the Grand Prix has concluded.

Clean Bandit, one of the biggest names in pop music, have scored four UK No.1 hits, won a Grammy award, and collaborated with a star-studded list of artists including Lizzo, Sean Paul, Ellie Goulding, Mabel and Demi Lovato.

They recently received two Brit Award nominations for their 2018 smash “Solo” featuring Lovato, which became their fourth UK chart-topper. The band have now notched up nine UK top five singles, more than Bruno Mars or Adele.

On March 26, DJ Axwell will perform after the qualifying session has ended, guaranteeing a world class weekend of live racing action and entertainment for all fans.

The Saudi Motorsport Co., the promoter of the Saudi Grand Prix, confirmed that fans will also be able to see the F2 and Porsche Sprint Challenge Middle East support series, while entertainment activities, fan festivals, and live concerts will also take place across the circuit and F1 fan zone all weekend.


AlUla a ‘cinematic wonder,’ says exec on 5th anniversary of Saudi Arabia’s Film AlUla

Updated 18 May 2025
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AlUla a ‘cinematic wonder,’ says exec on 5th anniversary of Saudi Arabia’s Film AlUla

CANNES: AlUla’s natural landscapes are fast becoming a national icon for Saudi Arabia, attracting tourists who wish to experience the scenes for themselves. But since the inception of Film AlUla, the region’s film agency, its sand dunes and historic landmarks have traveled the world through cinema. 

As Film AlUla celebrates its fifth anniversary, Acting Executive Director Zaid Shaker sat down with Arab News to discuss the entity’s milestones on the sidelines of the Cannes Film Festival in France.

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

A post shared by Film AlUla (@filmalula)

“I think that our voice and our positioning (of) Film AlUla as a catalyst in the Saudi film industry has sort of echoed, and now we have amazing infrastructure,” Shaker said. 

Only seven years ago, cinemas reopened in the Kingdom after a 35-year ban. The establishment of Film AlUla in early 2020, under the mandate of the Royal Commission of AlUla, has played a hand in cementing Saudi Arabia’s role in the international film industry. 

One of Film AlUla’s headlining achievements is Tawfik Alzaidi’s “Norah,” released in 2023, which became the first Saudi feature film to premiere at Cannes. The film, which followed the story of a young girl in the 1990s with a thirst for artistic expression, featured a crew made up of 40 percent AlUla locals. 

This year, first-time director Osama Al Khurayji’s “Siwar” was the opener for the Saudi Film Festival, held at the King Abdulaziz Center for World Culture (Ithra) in Dhahran in April. The film follows two families, one Saudi and one Turkish, as they navigate societal challenges and personal upheavals. Here, AlUla acts as a stand in for the southern city of Najran and the shoot featured an 80 percent local crew. 

Film AlUla executives have long emphasized training the local community as part of their core mission.

The area is home to roughly 65,000 residents, the executive said, and one of the core factors to creating a sustainable film sector is establishing a well-trained local crew. This is done through training programs for capacity-building and skill refinement. 

“Whenever we work on attracting an international production, our organic by-product is sort of upskilling the locals so that they can take this forward and start narrating their own stories,” Shaker said.

The entity recently announced a partnership with Manhattan Beach Studios, which operates more than 600 sound stages around the globe, as operators for their local facilities.

“We try to do everything looking at very high quality and the highest of standards… In partnering with MB Studios to manage our cutting-edge, state-of-the-art facilities, we are showing commitment locally, regionally and internationally, that our positioning is real, and that we offer a seamless, advanced experience to every storyteller that comes to AlUla,” Shaker said.

Some of the first major Hollywood productions to shoot in the region were Anthony and Joe Russo’s drama “Cherry,” and Ric Roman Waugh’s “Kandahar,” and others followed. In 2024 alone, AlUla hosted 85 projects, ranging from films and TV series to commercials and music videos. 

These productions are largely incentivized by the country’s rebates policies, operated under the umbrella of the Saudi Film Commission and the National Rebate Fund.

“We offer 40 percent rebates and an uplift of 10 percent incentives, which are usually designed based on training programs and marketing efforts,” he said. 

This rebate can be elevated to 50 percent when Saudi nationals are employed in key roles within the production.

“AlUla is blessed with a vast, diverse collection of amazing locations. It’s awe inspiring — it’s a cinematic wonder in itself. So part of the attraction and work in bringing productions and building a film sector relies on the sense of location,” Shaker said.

“It’s building on this amazing backdrop, which spans, in its history, more than 200,000 years. The … location has witnessed lots of cultures, lots of civilizations, lots of stories. It’s how we position these amazing, inspiring locations to be pivotal characters in any audio-visual production.”


Palestinian Film Institute amplifies local stories at Cannes

Updated 18 May 2025
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Palestinian Film Institute amplifies local stories at Cannes

DUBAI: The Palestinian Film Institute is making a resounding statement at the Cannes Film Festival with its largest presence to date under the banner #HereThereAndForever.

This year’s Pavilion Program spans a range of activities including exhibitions, screenings, producer talks, and intimate meet-and-greet sessions, reflecting a commitment to amplifying Palestinian voices on the global stage.

“We’re not celebrating being in Cannes,” PFI programmer Mohanad Yaqubi said in an interview with The Hollywood Reporter. “There’s nothing to celebrate for us … it’s really about orienting the narrative surrounding Palestinian cinema and Palestinian stories through the filmmakers themselves.

“We feel the responsibility, and it’s very hard,” he said. “Some of our members actually have families in Gaza now, and they are here in Cannes. It’s uncomfortable, but this is not an industry only for rich people. We have to make that industry accommodate us and our needs as an oppressed and underrepresented (group).”

A major highlight of the program is the official launch of the PFI Film Fund. According to Yaqubi, the fund represents a dream long in the making. “The aim for the first three rounds is to fund or support four to six projects in different formats, at least, to give them a base so that they can start working,” he said.

In addition, PFI is hosting a special spotlight session on Palestinian producers, as well as a reception featuring filmmakers Arab and Tarzan Nasser, whose film “Once Upon a Time in Gaza” is part of the Un Certain Regard lineup. Another notable event is the screening and reception for “From Ground Zero,” an initiative spearheaded by filmmaker Rashid Masharawi. The anthology film is a collection of eight short documentaries and two feature-length films by 22 Palestinian directors, each offering raw glimpses into life under airstrikes in Gaza.

With four Palestinian producers participating in the Producers’ Network, Yaqubi encouraged attendees to explore their slates, which he described as “the upcoming Palestinian films and narratives that need to be supported.”

Yaqubi’s aims are clear. “We hope to be here every year,” he said. “The presence is important, and to stay away won’t make a change. We have to dip our toes in the cold water and change things.”


 


Landmark exhibition ‘Layered Medium’ brings six decades of Korean art to the GCC

Updated 16 May 2025
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Landmark exhibition ‘Layered Medium’ brings six decades of Korean art to the GCC

DUBAI: The first large-scale showcase of contemporary Korean art in the Gulf Cooperation Council region, “Layered Medium: We Are in Open Circuits – Contemporary Art from Korea, 1960s to Today,” promises to be a transformative experience for audiences in the Middle East.

Co-curated by Maya El-Khalil of the Abu Dhabi Music & Arts Foundation and Yeo Kyung-hwan of the Seoul Museum of Art, the exhibition brings together a sweeping collection of artworks that explore the evolution of Korean contemporary art from its roots in the 1960s to the present day.

Held at the Abu Dhabi art gallery Manarat Al-Saadiyat from May 16 to June 30, the exhibition marks a historic cultural bridge between Korea and the region, offering insights into how Korean artists have responded to shifts in political landscapes, technological advancements, and the complexities of modernity.

Ayoung Kim, Still image from Delivery Dancer's Sphere, 2022, single-channel video, 25 min. (Courtesy of the artist)

“This exhibition is a testament to the power of art to transcend boundaries and ignite conversations across cultures,” said El-Khalil to Arab News. “It’s an opportunity for audiences to witness the dynamism and resilience of Korean art over decades of transformation.”

El-Khalil drew on her first experiences in Seoul, which she described as a “moment of discovery.” For her, the city revealed what she called “productive contradictions”: an art scene that was deeply specific to its context but spoke to universal experiences of urbanization, globalization, and technological change.

“This tension between specificity and universality became central to our curatorial approach. Rather than trying to explain Korean art, we wanted to create frameworks that would allow audiences to encounter works through shared experiences of inhabiting our rapidly shifting, technologically mediated worlds,” El-Khalil said.

Ayoung Kim, Installation view of Delivery Dancer's Sphere (2022) from the exhibition "What an Artificial World (National Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art,
Cheongju, Korea, 2024)." (National Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art, Korea, Photography Hong Choelki)

The exhibition begins with the immediate sensory experiences of the body, intersecting with social constructs of gender, nationality, and identity. From there it connects to cultural narratives of history and tradition before engaging with contemporary spatial realities of rapid urbanisation and precarious ecologies. It begins with its experimental phases in the 1960s, moving through the politically charged works of the 1980s, and culminating in the boundary pushing digital and multimedia explorations of today.

Yeo explained the curatorial decision. “We experience reality through our bodies, our social structures, and our physical and virtual terrains. By organizing the exhibition through this expanded sense of medium — as atmospheres of meaning-making — we created a framework that reflects circuits of experience: from our immediate bodily presence to our social relationships, to our navigation of built environments striated with power and control.”

Byungjun Kwon, Dancing Ladders, credit MMCA (2). (Supplied)

Among the standout works are installations that challenge conventional perceptions of space and time, multimedia projects that intertwine Korean folklore with digital storytelling, and large-scale sculptures that articulate the tension between tradition and innovation. El-Khalil spoke of parallels between Seoul and Abu Dhabi, citing rapid urbanization and globalization as shared narratives.

“Both cities are the product of rapid, accelerated development, each environment a remarkable narrative of transformation, though the stories are quite distinct: South Korea emerging after war and poverty, while the UAE grew quickly thanks to a clear vision and the discovery of natural resources,” she said.

“What’s really interesting is how artists in both places respond to similar changes like urbanisation or globalisation but from different cultural perspectives. Even though these changes seem global, they’re always shaped by local histories and ideas about the future. For example, Sung Hwan Kim’s ‘Temper Clay’ (2012), set in uniform apartment blocks, looks at the emotional and social impact of this kind of growth. These parallels allowed us to explore how different societies process similar transformations through different historical and cultural frameworks,” she added.

Ram Han, Room type 01, 2018. (Collection of Seoul Museum of Art)

The exhibition also highlights the impact of technological revolutions on Korean art, particularly in the realm of video and digital installations that emerged in the late 1990s. “Korean artists have always been at the forefront of exploring new media, often using technology as a medium to dissect cultural narratives and global dialogues,” said Yeo. “Their work is a testament to adaptability and forward-thinking—an open circuit that is constantly evolving.”

In addition to the main exhibition, “Layered Medium” features a series of panel discussions, workshops, and interactive installations aimed at engaging the community in dialogue about the role of contemporary art in shaping cultural identity and understanding. El-Khalil emphasized the importance of these community-focused initiatives: “We want this exhibition to be more than just a visual experience; it’s a platform for learning and cross-cultural exchange.”

As the first large-scale Korean art exhibition in the GCC, “Layered Medium” is poised to set a new standard for artistic collaboration between Korea and the Middle East. With its emphasis on dialogue, innovation, and historical reflection, the exhibition not only showcases the richness of Korean artistic expression but also reinforces the universal language of art as a bridge across diverse cultures.

“Ultimately, our hope is that visitors leave with a deeper appreciation for the complexity and beauty of Korean contemporary art,” said Yeo. “It’s about creating connections—not just between East and West, but across generations, mediums, and ideologies.”


Red Sea fund honors 7 women in cinema at Cannes festival

Updated 16 May 2025
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Red Sea fund honors 7 women in cinema at Cannes festival

  • Female voices in movies vital, they tell Arab News
  • High praise for the Kingdom’s Red Sea Film Fund

CANNES: Seven Saudi Arabia and international women filmmakers and artists were honored at the Cannes International Film Festival on Thursday night.

Elham Ali, Jacqueline Fernandez, Gaya Jiji, Amina Khalil, Rungano Nyoni, Sarah Taibah, and Engfa Waraha were recognized for their work at the Red Sea Film Fund’s Women in Cinema Gala event.

Several of the women spoke to Arab News about the importance of women’s voices in cinema, and had high praise for the Kingdom’s efforts to support them.

South Asian actress and performer Fernandez said: “At my 15th year in film, and being part of the industry, this really culminates and really motivates me to keep going and to do more and to rise and it couldn’t have come at a better time.

“​​Just meeting the women and the talent here, seeing how women are supporting women on such a platform has been so inspiring. I feel every artist constantly needs to feel motivated and inspired, and this is one of those moments for me.”

The former Miss Universe honoree transitioned into film in the Indian industry with breakout performances in “Murder 2” (2011) and “Housefull 2” (2012).

She also starred in commercial successes “Race 2” (2013) and “Kick” (2014) opposite Salman Khan.

“I think that their (RSFF) passion to promote film and to promote the technicians and to promote the industry has been very, very admirable.

“The fact that also they are not just focusing on Saudi, but they’re looking at more of a global reach for their talent, and they’re also looking at connecting and bringing together other cultures within that.

“It really is what cinema is all about, right?” she said.

Saudi Arabia actress and presenter Ali emphasized the importance of investing in domestic cinema infrastructure, as exemplified by efforts of the Film Commission, Film AlUla, the RSFF, and independent grassroots initiatives.

“There’s nothing more important than cinema to present a history and cement stories.

“Cinema is the platform to transfer our stories to the world, and the fastest to do that, and that’s why I’m with and support this industry and I still (strive) for more.

“Yes, we’ve reached such a beautiful point today by seeing our work displayed at international festivals, like Cannes and others, but that’s why we need more.

“We’re taking quick, powerful, and creative steps,” she said.

She added that cultural sensitivities remain a challenge but younger filmmakers were dealing with them slowly.

Zambian-Welsh director, screenwriter and actress Nyoni told Arab News: “I feel fortunate to be recognized.

“It feels like someone, somewhere is listening or at least paying attention a little bit, but also because the Red Sea (Film Fund) spotlights specific areas that are not very popular.

“People always go to the usual suspects and I always love especially when people come to Africa.

“It’s such a rarity because, actually, the benefit is you don’t get to be very popular, these are not very sexy places to go to, and I love that they finance filmmakers.

“That's the bit that I find really amazing.”

Nyoni gained recognition with her early shorts, including “The List” (2009), and with her more recent feature films, “I am not a witch” (2017) and “On becoming a guinea fowl” (2024).

They have all earned her numerous awards including the Un Certain Regard Award for Best Director at Cannes last year. 

Syrian filmmaker Gaya Jiji, whose first feature “My Favorite Fabric” was also selected in the Un Certain Regard section in 2018, said the right support for women in cinema is emerging now globally.

She attended the Red Sea Film Festival three years ago, which supported her movie. And the festival is a co-producer of her second feature “Pieces of Foreign Life.”

She said that the RSIFF has helped create space for women, specifically from Saudi Arabia, which was a step to fulfilling the Vision 2030 plan.

Thai actress Waraha said the RSIFF has given a spotlight for women in Asia to have a bigger platform on a global level.

“​​In Thailand, it’s not that difficult for women to be in cinema, but on an international level, especially women of color, there’s language barriers.

“There’s looks that limit (me) to certain roles, which make it harder for me to bring into the international level with blockbuster movies,” she said.

Waraha gained recognition in 2023 for her lead role in the hit TV series “Show Me Love,” which marked her breakout performance.

Her role in “The Paradise of Thorns,” which she considers her breakout moment, earned her the Best Actress of the Year award at the 2025 Thailand Box Office Awards.

“I feel proud,” she said about receiving the Women in Cinema honor. “And I want to keep this as inspiration for both myself and for others.”

“I always say women are half of society, and they need to be half of the industry as well.

Honoree Taiba has dedicated her work to shedding light on “real women” in both a physical and emotional sense.

“As much as I’m really, really, really proud to be one of the seven highlighted women in cinema, I hope that we reach a point of equality in the industry that there are no such special events just for us,” she said.

She is the creator, writer and lead of the acclaimed dark comedy series “Jameel Jiddan,” and most recently finished shooting her feature film “A Matter of Life and Death,” which she stars in and wrote.

“As a woman — and I’m sure a lot of women relate to that — we really doubt our deserving of things.

“This year, I decided that … I’m worth it. I really worked hard, and I’m really proud of myself, that I’m in the right place at the right time of my life.”


Review: ‘The Eternaut’ — compelling post-apocalyptic sci-fi from Argentina

Updated 15 May 2025
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Review: ‘The Eternaut’ — compelling post-apocalyptic sci-fi from Argentina

DUBAI: At first, it seems like “The Eternaut” is going to be a climate-crisis-focused piece. It’s summer and Buenos Aires is boiling in more ways than one — demonstrations against government incompetence rage on the streets while power cuts only increase the oppressive heat felt by residents. Then a sudden fall of deadly radioactive snow kills hundreds of thousands instantly.

The snow continues to fall as survivors quickly work out that to venture outside without full body cover and masks is to guarantee death. A small group of middle-aged friends were enjoying their regular poker night when the snow began to fall, and it is on them that the series centers — particularly Juan Salvo, a veteran of the war between Argentina and the UK over the Falkland Islands (or the Malvinas, as they’re called in Argentina).

There are many other survivors, including people in the neighborhood they’ve known for years, and the show does a fine job of exploring the escalating paranoia as people accustom themselves to their new reality and realize that their acquaintances are potentially as deadly as the snow. There are echoes of the source material’s political edge too, as the line between neighbor and enemy blurs.

Juan (a convincingly grizzled Ricardo Darin) manages to find his ex-wife, but their daughter, Clara, is missing — she was at a friend’s house when the snowstorm started. Much of the first two episodes is taken up with Juan’s unsuccessful search for her. The starkly beautiful cinematography is often breathtaking, and the claustrophobia is palpable, both in the houses of the survivors and in the suits they must wear to go anywhere.

Halfway through the six episodes, though, there’s a grinding shift of gears. The apocalypse, it tuns out, was actually the result of an alien invasion, the first wave of which involves giant bugs. Juan’s super-smart friend Tano correctly predicts that the bugs are controlled by something more sinister.

That sudden shift means the enjoyable slow-burn grittiness of the opening episodes is lost, as the show becomes more CGI-action-based. It’s still gripping, but what had promised to be a unique standout fades into something far more generic.