Amjad Al-Rasheed’s INSHALLAH A BOY wins Best First Film at Bengaluru International Film Festival

Amjad Al-Rasheed’s critically acclaimed Jordanian feature — and the country’s entry for Best International Feature Film at the 96th Academy Awards — INSHALLAH A BOY has won the Best First Film Award as part of the Asian Cinema Competition at the 15th Bengaluru International Film Festival (BIFFes) which ran from February 29th to March 7th in Bengaluru, India.

Since its historic world premiere at the time-honored Cannes Film Festival — where it was one of the first two Jordanian films to be featured at the event and received two prestigious awards — has enjoyed a brilliant festival tour and brought home its fair share of trophies.

The most recent of these accolades is the Best Performance Award from the Red Sea International Film Festival and the Asia Pacific Screen Awards, the Best Actress Award at the Thessaloniki International Film Festival, the Best Screenplay for a Narrative Feature Award from the Mystic Film Festival, and the Golden Frog for Best Directorial Debut at the esteemed Camerimage IFF in Poland.

The film also scored the Women’s Jury Award and the Grand Jury Award at the Paysages de Cineastes Festival as well as Best Actress and a Jury Award at the Rotterdam Arab Film Festival.

INSHALLAH A BOY has screened at over 30 prestigious film festivals such as the Karlovy Vary, Melbourne, Toronto, BFI London, Sydney, Hamburg, Stockholm, Ghent, Busan, Rio de Janeiro, Mumbai, Montclair, Chennai, Palm Springs, and Kerala film festivals.

Moreover, during its festival tour, the film has generated a huge buzz and gotten rave reviews from prominent international and local critics from A-list media publications like Screen Daily, the New York Times, Variety, Al Jazeera, and Independent Arabia, all of whom praised its compelling narrative, masterful direction, and exceptional performances, establishing it as a standout cinematic masterpiece across Jordan’s nascent film industry.

Among these reviews is one from Variety’s Jessica Kiang, who started her article with a strong headline: ‘A Gripping Social Drama About Systemic Oppression That Morphs into a Masterful Thriller.’

Meanwhile, Israa Radaydeh of Jordan News commented, “Al-Rasheed’s nuanced storytelling, coupled with the stellar performances of the cast, elevates this cinematic experience to a powerful and emotionally resonant exploration of the challenges faced by women in Jordanian society,” and Film Threat’s Abhishek Sharma lauded the film’s acting as “superb” and its pacing as “remarkable.”

INSHALLAH A BOY tells the story of the recently widowed Nawal, who has to save her daughter and home following her husband’s death in a society where having a son is a game changer.

Directed by Al-Rasheed and co-written alongside Delphine Agut and Rula Nasser, the film stars Mouna Hawa, Haitham Omari, Salwa Nakkara, Yumna Marwan, Mohammad Al-Jizawi, Islam Al-Awadi, and Celina Rabab’a.

Additionally, the film was produced by Nasser and Abu Ayyash; co-produced by Youssef Abdelnabi, Raphaël Alexandre, and Nicolas Leprêtre; associate produced by Alaa Karkouti, Maher Diab, and Shahinaz El-Akkad; lensed by Kanamé Onoyama (Everything Everywhere All at Once); edited by the prolific Ahmed Hafez (Moon Knight); sound mixed by Nour Halawani; and scored by Jerry Lane. Also, Zeina Soufan and Nasser Zoubi served as the project’s costume and production designers, respectively.

In terms of the larger companies at play, the film was produced by Imaginarium Films and co-produced by Georges Films and Bayt Al-Shawareb. Meanwhile, MAD Solutions and Lagoonie Film Production are in charge of distributing it all over the Arab world, and Pyramide International is handling international sales and distribution in France.

INSHALLAH A BOY is the second collaboration between Amjad and MAD Solutions, as the company had distributed the short film THE PARROT — which he co-directed —, the film won many international awards, including the Jury Prize at the Twin Cities Arab Film Festivals in Minnesota and the Malmo Arab Film Festival in Sweden. It had its world premiere at the Dubai International Film Festival in 2016 and is currently showing on OSN.

A Jordanian director and writer born in 1985, Al-Rasheed holds an MFA in cinematic arts with a focus on directing and editing. In 2016, he was selected by Screen International as one of five Arab Stars of Tomorrow — a list highlighting the up-and-coming young talents of the region. He also attended the Talent Campus during the 57th Berlinale, after which he directed short films that garnered nominations and won prizes at various Arab and international film festivals.

His filmography includes THE PARROT — a short film he co-directed in 2016 that was funded by the Film Prize of the Robert Bosch Stiftung — HIT THE ROAD (2011), and BITTER DAYS (2010).

As for Rula Nasser, she is an independent Jordanian producer with extensive experience in different aspects of the production of commercials, TV series, and low-budget films, all the way to big-budget studio films.

She kicked off her career working on projects with the BBC and Discovery and then worked for five years with the Jordanian Royal Film Commission before founding The Imaginarium Films in 2011. Since then the company’s productions have been selected for all manner of prestigious film festivals, including Cannes, Venice, Berlinale, and Toronto.