A round-up of my cinema-going experience in the UAE in the past year, followed by a list of favourite new films of 2024.

Last year, Magic Mike’s The Last Dance was released in the UAE with a 21+ rating which meant nothing was censored, and that was the last time a film with this rating was released in the country.

Quite a few films like Challengers, Hit Man, Blink Twice, The Return, We Live in Time, and Better Man (which I watched last night and found it to be surprisingly enjoyable and moving) were released here with an 18+ rating, scenes showing nudity and sex (straight or gay) were cut. The promise of no more “editing films for adult content with introduction of 21 age rating” in 2021 was short lived. Films like. So the usual case of sometimes watching films in this country and having to read between the scenes.

As for locally made films, I watched two in the cinema, Three by Nayla Al Khaja, her first feature film after making many short films and commercials for the past 15 years. An Arabic and English language film that stars Arab and non-Arab actors, including Jefferson Hall. Before it was released, it was marketed as a horror film about science and faith with a story line about a young boy possessed by an evil spirit, and the trailer made the film look like a mimic of generic Western horror films. After its release, there was a strong emphasis on themes of loneliness and mental health from the interviews I read with the director.
Set in Dubai, but parts of it shot in Bangkok, the film is competently made featuring a mostly good cast, but with a weak script. It lacked the tension needed to make a film like this on the edge of your seat. Some have compared it to The Exorcist, but I wouldn’t go that far.

Al Eid Eidan by Maitha Alawadi is comedy about a Saudi-Emirati family who visit Abu Dhabi for Eid and ends up being a advert for Abu Dhabi’s Yas Island and Warner Bros. World and Warner Bros. Hotel.

Saudi Arabia has been funding a lot more films (local and international) compared to the UAE. Mandoob / Night Courier (Ali Kalthami) which premiered at TIFF last year was released in the UAE in January. Kalthami is one of the founders of Telfaz which started out as a collective making videos posted on YouTube and gained a following and rose to fame because of their slyly anti-establishment comedy about culture and society in Saudi Arabia. In the past few years they’ve turned into a full on film production house and receive government funding to make films.

Set in Riyadh, Mandoob is about an overworked delivery driver, hustle culture, bootlegging and the rich vs the poor. I was enjoying the film till its ending which was far removed from any anti-establishment sentiments that was present in the older works by the director and his collective.

Just like Warner Bros. wanted to bury Clint Eastwood’s Juror #2, film distributors and cinemas in the UAE (and not sure who’s at fault more) like to bury releases of what would be described as small or non-blockbuster films, by just releasing them for one week and sometimes only in a handful of cinemas and at odd timings.

The most shocking example of this was the release of All We Imagine is Light, the first Indian film to win a Grand Prix Award at Cannes and one would have thought it would have been everywhere considering the large Indian and Malayalam speaking population in the country, and the amount of Indian films that get released here. It’s as if the decision makers here had the same mentality as India’s Oscar Committee.

Other throwaway releases of films, some critically acclaimed and premiered at the top film festivals include:
Asphalt City (Jean-Stéphane Sauvaire)
Christmas Eve at Miller’s Crossing (Tyler Taormina)
Day of the Fight (Jack Huston)
The End We Start From (Mahalia Belo)
Exhuma (Jang Jae-hyun)
Cobweb (Kim Jee-woon)
The Return (Uberto Pasolini)
The White Dress (Gilan Auf)

If I didn’t check the cinema websites every week, I wouldn’t have known these films were shown here. I watched all of them except The White Dress which was released when I was out of town and didn’t stay for longer than week.

Since April this year, film critic and writer A. S. Hamrah has been emailing a weekly newsletter titled Last Week in End Cinema Times, a list of the ridiculous and bad decisions made by Hollywood studio heads, questionable news coverage and headlines by film publications, the infiltration of AI in the film industry and much more. It is sharp, funny and a great record of what is wrong with the film industry today.

n+1 published an excellent piece by Will Tavlin titled Casual Viewing about Netflix, its origins and business strategy, and its destructive impact on people’s film viewing habits and in the film industry in general. It was published on December 16, please read it if you haven’t already, it is one of the most important film related essays published this year.

Even Netflix knows its users can’t find titles that they like. In 2021, the company briefly introduced a new feature on its home page, called “Play Something,” to help in what the streamer called “times when we just don’t want to make decisions.” When clicked, Play Something instantly began playing for users an algorithmically chosen series or film. “Whether you’re in the mood for a new or familiar favorite,” Netflix wrote, “just ‘Play Something’ and let Netflix handle the rest.”
“Play Something,” as in: play anything. It doesn’t matter if it’s good or bad, if a user is on their phone or cleaning their room. What matters is that it’s on, and that it stays on until Netflix asks its perennial question, a prompt that appears when the platform thinks a user has fallen asleep: “Are you still watching?”

But despite a state of “cinema collapse” as Hamrah signs off each newsletter, and so many people’s reliance on Netflix or other online streamers to watch, or casually watch films at home, there are many great new films from all over the world out there if you pay attention, and know where to look.

This is my top 30 favourite new films this year, starting with my top 10 of the year and the rest in alphabetical order, followed by honourable mentions. (I’m counting the two chapters of Horizon: An American Saga as one film.)

Caught by the Tides (Jia Zhangke)
Being John Smith (John Smith)
Challengers (Luca Guadagnino)
Conclave (Edward Berger)
Henry Fonda for President (Alexander Horwath)
Horizon: An American Saga – Chapter 1 and Chapter 2 (Kevin Costner)
Love (Dag Johan Haugerud)
Matt and Mara (Kazik Radwanski)
Megalopolis (Francis Ford Coppola)
Trap (M. Night Shyamalan)
All We Imagine as Light (Payal Kapadia)
Babygirl (Halina Reijn)
Drama 1882 (Wael Shawky)
A Fidai Film (Kamal Aljafar)
From Ground Zero
Israel Palestine on Swedish TV 1958-1989 (Göran Olsson)
Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga (George Miller)
I’m Not Everything I Want to Be (Klára Tasovská)
The Iron Claw (Sean Durkin)
Longlegs (Osgood Perkins)
Janet Planet (Annie Baker)
Juror #2 (Clint Eastwood)
Malaikottai Vaaliban (Lijo Jose Pellissery)
The Outrun (Nora Fingscheidt)
Raayan (Dhanush)
Red Rooms (Pascal Plante)
Samsara (Lois Patiño)
Smile 2 (Parker Finn)
Super Happy Forever (Igarashi Kohei)
The Zone of Interest (Jonathan Glazer)

I think I liked Gladiator II, The Fall Guy and Twisters more than most, and I also really liked the following that I’ve seen mentioned in a few end of year lists this year: Afternoons of Solitude, The Damned, Maria, Misericordia, The Room Next Door , The Settlers, The Wild Robot, Who by Fire

But for honourable mentions, I would like to bring these films to your attention:

7 Walks with Mark Brown (Vincent Barré, Pierre Creton)
Aicha (Mehdi M. Barsaoui)
Christmas Eve in Miller’s Point (Tyler Taormina)
Day of the Fight (Jack Huston)
Diciannove Giovanni Tortorici)
Flight 404 (Hani Khalifa)
Paul & Paulette Take a Bath (Jethro Massey)
Razeh-del (Maryam Tafakory)
Revolving Rounds (Johann Lurf, Christina Jauernik)
Seeking Haven for Mr. Rambo (Khaled Mansour)
Universal Language (Matthew Rankin)

Cinema forever and ever.

Favourite New Films of 2024