El Gouna’s CineGouna Expands Industry Push: ‘We Want to Give Every Filmmaker a Chance’

More than 320 Arab film projects applied to CineGouna Funding this year, including more than 100 from Egypt, as the industry arm of Egypt’s El Gouna Film Festival drew submissions from across the region. At the festival’s ninth edition, running through Oct. 23 on the Red Sea, CineGouna is adding new initiatives as it looks to fill gaps in the regional film landscape.

The volume of Egyptian submissions alone prompted El Gouna to create Egyptian Voices, a new strand giving four additional local projects training in pitching, packaging and co-production.

“There are three big gaps in the Arab world,” Ahmed Shawky, who heads CineGouna Funding, tells Variety, pointing to the lack of national film funds in many countries, limited co-production treaties and the volatility of regional funding.

Shawky, a film critic and festival programmer, points to Egypt, where the film commission focuses on attracting foreign productions rather than financing local films. “In Egypt, we don’t have a national film fund, with 100 years of cinema history, more than 4,000 features,” he notes.

Regional funds have helped fill some of that void, but Shawky says their resources can fluctuate, leaving filmmakers uncertain about available support.

At El Gouna this week, CineGouna Funding awarded more than $350,000 in cash and services, with 40 awards going to 16 of the 19 participating projects. Syrian filmmaker Rama Abdy’s documentary “House No. 7,” about three women building a refuge in Damascus, won the $15,000 CineGouna Platform Award for a project in post-production. Algerian filmmaker Zoulikha Tahar’s “Paradise Beach,” previously selected for Berlinale Talents, took the $15,000 award for a project in development.

Sudanese filmmaker Marwa Zein’s “Lily’s Makkah,” her first fiction feature after the documentary “Khartoum Offside,” received a €10,000 grant, post-production support and an invitation to Durban FilmMart. The participating projects also held more than 140 one-on-one meetings with companies, institutions and international festivals.

CineGouna’s work extends beyond financing. CineGouna Emerge, its program for emerging filmmakers and film professionals from Egypt, the Arab world and Africa, focuses on access.

Egyptian filmmaker, producer and programmer Hayat Aljowaily, who heads Emerge, recalls that the program initially focused on covering the costs of bringing participants to El Gouna. But getting newcomers through the door did not necessarily give them the confidence or connections to navigate a film festival.

“Year after year, we realized that access alone wasn’t enough, and that we had to create an environment and carve out a space for these participants,” she explains. “It’s about creating a community,” she goes on.

Emerge has since added mentorship, workshops, industry meetings and a dedicated “campus” in the heart of the festival. More than 300 participants have passed through the program, with this year’s cohort spanning 16 nationalities and including Egyptians from 20 of the country’s 27 governorates.

For Aljowaily, that geographic reach is central to Emerge’s purpose. “It’s not just for Cairo, but also for other cities,” she says, noting that El Gouna “is not really accessible for all Egypt.”

Aljowaily points to a young woman from Upper Egypt who came to El Gouna last year having never been to a cinema. Selected from around 1,000 applicants, she pitched a project that was picked up by an Egyptian short-film producer and received one of two university scholarships, allowing her to move to Cairo to study cinema.

Other participants have moved between different parts of CineGouna. Jordanian filmmaker Asmahan Bakirat pitched as a director last year, returned this year as a producer and was selected for Emerge’s Rising Stars program.

CineGouna Forum, headed by producer and screenwriter Ahmed Amer, brings filmmakers and industry figures together for panels, masterclasses and discussions.

This year’s sessions included “Producing Against the Odds,” featuring Palestinian producer May Odeh, who has three films at the festival (“Safe Exit,” “Yesterday the Eye Didn’t Sleep,” “Dear Ajayi” and “Outside the Expected Frame”) with Toronto Film Festival programming director Robyn Citizen.

Amer sees tighter financing as potentially pushing filmmakers toward lower budgets and different creative choices, including genre films. But money is not the only resource he thinks the region needs.

“Filmmakers need more creative producers,” Amer stresses. “Funding is definitely an issue, but creative producers are needed badly.”

“I often meet filmmakers and producers who are only thinking about their current projects,” Amer continues. “We often forget that we need to carefully plan a career. One film is a part of a longer journey.”

For Shawky, financing can also influence the kinds of films that get made. He sees two currents among Arab filmmakers: those responding directly to war, political upheaval and social issues, and others pursuing more personal or genre-driven stories. International funds and markets often favor the former, he argues.

“Only focusing on traumatizing topics makes filmmakers impose self-censorship,” Shawky contends. “Even if they have two topics, they will pick the one that sounds sexy for funders.”

“We want to give every filmmaker a chance,” he adds. “And it’s up to the artist to decide whether to tackle those topics or simply make art.”

Lebanese filmmaker Karim Kassem’s “Pipes,” which premiered in Karlovy Vary’s Crystal Globe competition, came through CineGouna Funding, where it won a Red Sea post-production award that helped complete its sound mix.

“But it wasn’t only the award,” Kassem recalls. “The contacts I made here, before and after the pitch, were incredibly important to the journey of the film.”

Moroccan filmmaker Yassine El Idrissi had a similar trajectory with “Halima,” which came to CineGouna in post-production before premiering in Shanghai’s main competition and winning best director and best actress. “CineGouna was the first platform we applied to,” he explains. “That gave us confidence in the project and helped make the film known.”

Both filmmakers return to El Gouna this year with their completed films in competition, completing what Shawky describes as a “full circuit.”

As El Gouna approaches its 10th edition, Shawky says the next step is strengthening CineGouna’s international presence and developing more year-round activity beyond the annual festival.