Arab women film-makers in Spotlight

The Qatar quartet behind The Lyrics Revolt

It's an event dedicated to women in film -and this year the Birds Eye View Film Festival in London focuses only on features made by Arab female directors.

The reason for this, according to its programme director Elhum Shakerifar, is that their work is currently on a size and scale unmatched elsewhere.

"Over the last year we have travelled to places like Doha in Qatar, Dubai and Abu Dhabi, and there is a huge feeling of excitement in these places," she explains.

"There's a new wave of film-making in the Arab world, and women are at the front of it.

"However, we know that by doing this, we're facing a dual problem," she adds.

"Not only is there stereotyping around 'the female director', but we also have to contend with the Western media stereotype of the Arab female. But none of these films deliver what you expect."

'Beautiful tension'

The event opens with the UK premiere of When I Saw You, by Annemarie Jacir, who in 2007 became the first Palestinian woman to make a feature film.

It also features the work of a first-time British-Egyptian director. In The Shadow Of A Man, by 24-year-old Hanan Abdullah, exposes the beliefs of four Egyptian women on equality in the wake of the Arab Spring.

In 2012, the California-based Center for the Study of Women in Television and Film reported that just 9% of directors in the US were women.

In the same year, no woman competed for the prestigious Palme d'Or prize at the Cannes Film Festival.

Yet the Doha Film Institute in Qatar, which funds local film-makers, reports that 42% of all its grants since 2010 have been to women, and that last year a third of all films shown at the Doha Tribeca Film Festival were by female directors.