Pakistani actress, comedian and co-founder of Patangeer, Amtul Baweja, who also plays the protagonist in the short film, Solatia, said that she is “very excited” over her project entering the Red Sea Film Festival, scheduled to happen in Jeddah next month.
“I’m very, very excited, because it happens to be our first submission,” Baweja spoke to Arab News. “And of course, getting selected on your first submission is, I think, a win in itself.”
Directed by Pakistani filmmaker, Hira Yousafzai, and co-produced by Hirra Farooqi, Solatia, will be competing with entries from Germany, Indonesia, the US, Iran, and South Africa at the prestigious festival.
The short film revolves around Zamda — essayed by Baweja — a displaced woman living in shelter with others. The despondent woman spends time looking through old photos of her missing husband as she longs for him.
Speaking of the short film and her moving character, Baweja said, “As soon as I read the script, I was like, ‘Okay, I need to do this, I need to make this happen. I want to do this.’ And I think wherever this film will be played, people will relate to it.”
“Despite losing everything, Zamda is a strong character. You can see from the start that Zamda is a very, very strong woman. She’s not afraid to stand up for what’s right.”
Farooqi, a first-generation Canadian immigrant with Afghan-Pakistani parents, brilliantly defined how immigrants are “merely looked at as numbers and are often not humanized,” and said that she wanted to “humanize their stories.”
“We wanted to humanize their stories by tying in these themes of hope, love, loss, resilience, through the characters and through the compassion that they feel for one another,” she said.
Baweja’s Solatia is one of only two Pakistani short films and 14 entries in total competing in the Red Sea: Shorts Competition at the festival’s third edition scheduled to take place in Jeddah from November 30 to December 9.
https://en.dailypakistan.com.pk/08-Oct-2023/pakistani-film-in-flames-wins-coveted-int-l-award
