Widely respected as a top Arab cinema expert, Dubai Film Festival artistic director Masoud Amralla Al Ali has been instrumental to creating the top platform for local pics in the Arab world. He spoke to Variety about how the event has helped foster a film industry from scratch in the Gulf and some of the main challenges faced by Arab cinema at large. Excerpts: Why did you pick “Miss Sloane” as the opening movie? It’s topical, it’s recent. It talks about what’s happening in the U.S. and how this can affect the world. Also the female character is very strong. All of these elements played into it. We have lots of female directors in the Arab world, maybe more than in the West. This year for the first time we have three films from Qatar by female filmmakers.

 

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