Indie director Khalid Fahad's Ithra-produced 'Valley Road' is the closing film at this year's Red Sea IFF - Moving Image Middle East

The King Abdulaziz Center for World Culture (Ithra) announced its information astatine the 2nd Red Sea International Film Festival successful Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, present ongoing. Ithra Film Productions’ Valley Road by award-winning Saudi manager Khalid Fahad volition beryllium the closing movie astatine the festival. Two different projects, the Ithra-supported shorts A Swing and Old Phone Number are besides being screened astatine the festival, alongside the premiere of the Ithra Content Initiative movie King’s Poem. Furthermore, the taste center’s Creative Solutions programme volition showcase its inaugural projects astatine the festival’s virtual world section.

One of the largest movie producers successful the Kingdom, Ithra Film Productions supports Saudi Arabia’s increasing movie manufacture by nurturing home-grown endowment and fostering cinematic contented creation, successful summation to presenting the Saudi acquisition to the satellite done cinema.

“Ithra is committed to advancing the Kingdom’s movie manufacture – some successful beforehand of and down the camera,” said Majed Z. Samman, Head of Performing Arts & Cinema astatine Ithra. “We supply a purposeful and technological abstraction for the Kingdom’s movie endowment to hone their skills and amusement their work, and we are anxious to stock our latest projects with the planetary movie industry.”

Valley Road, Fahad’s debut diagnostic film, follows the odyssey of Ali, a young lad with selective mutism who gets mislaid connected the mode to spot a doc successful a adjacent village. He finds himself unsocial successful the mediate of nowhere, wherever helium needs to flooded a bid of challenges. The movie features TV prima Mohammed El Shehri, vocalist and influencer Aseel Omran, prima of signifier and surface Naif Khalaf Althaqeel, and 10-year-old Hamad Farhan successful his archetypal acting role. The movie is the archetypal Saudi accumulation to unafraid a G-rating.

Valley Road, boasts an exclusive Pan-Arab formed and crew, represents the renaissance of the Kingdom’s movie industry, which PwC forecasts to turn to $1.5 cardinal by 2030. The Saudi Arabian Government has besides announced a bid of plans aimed astatine establishing Saudi Arabia arsenic a world-class movie hub and among the apical 20 movie industries globally wrong the adjacent fewer years.

This year’s Red Sea International Film Festival features a absorption connected Virtual Reality content, and Ithra volition showcase the apical 5 prototypes from the archetypal twelvemonth of Ithra’s Creative Solutions program, aimed astatine boosting KSA’s originative system by empowering integer contented instauration successful immersive technologies including virtual reality, augmented reality, mixed reality, immersive audio, haptics, and more. The year-round inaugural is designed to enrich, amended and animate originative individuals to make integer immersive content, and connects the participants with planetary professionals and investors to beforehand and nurture caller and innovative products. Applications for the 3rd twelvemonth opens connected February 1, 2023.

Ithra Film Productions has produced much than 20 films, of which 15 person received local, determination and planetary awards. Ithra is besides the driving unit down respective cardinal programs supporting the Saudi filmmaking scene. It is location to Saudi Film Days and the Ithra Film Society, which contiguous a afloat programme passim the year. Ithra is besides the cradle of the yearly Saudi Film Festival.

For much accusation connected Ithra and its programs, sojourn www.ithra.com.

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