The Arab Cinema Center (ACC) and six of its partners gave nine awards to support feature and documentary films participating in CineGouna SpringBoard, one of the initiatives organized by the CineGouna Platform within the 5th El Gouna Film Festival, which is also one of the ACC's partners.
List of Awards by ACC Partners:
ART:
USD 10,000 prize went to feature narrative project SINK by Zain Duraie.
Rotana:
USD 10,000 prize went to film project Happy Lovers directed by Hicham Lasri
MALMO Arab Film Festival:
USD 5,000 prize went to film project Haysh Maysh: False Drama directed by Hicham Lasri
IEFTA:
IEFTA (International Emerging Talent Film Association) provides an opportunity for the winning projects to join its Global Film Expression initiative. The award went to Aisha Can’t Fly Away Anymore, directed by Morad Mostafa and produced by Sawsan Yusuf and Women of My Life directed by Zahraa Ghandour
MAD Solutions and Ergo, Media Ventures:
The joint award offers distribution services across the Arab world with a guarantee of $30,000 for the filmmakers. The award went to Haysh Maysh: False Drama directed by Hicham Lasri.
Gemini Africa:
USD 5,000 prize went to film project Aisha Can’t Fly Away Anymore, directed by Morad Mostafa and produced by Sawsan Yusuf.
USD 7,000 Grant to obtain Master’s degree at the American University, USA went to film project Fifty Meters directed by Yomna Khattab
Arab Cinema Center:
An Invitation to an Arab producer to attend Rotterdam Lab of International Film Festival Rotterdam was extended to the film, Aisha Can’t Fly Away Anymore, directed by Morad Mostafa and produced by Sawsan Yusuf.
Organized by CineGouna Platform, CineGounaSpringBoard is a project development and co-production lab that enables Arab film directors and producers with projects in development or films in post-production to find artistic and financial support. This year, CineGouna SpringBoard’s committee of experts featured producer Rula Nasser (The Imaginarium Films), one of ACC partners.
CineGouna Platform is an industry-oriented event created to support and empower filmmakers and industry professionals, aiming to develop promising film projects from Egypt and the Arab world and help them find artistic and financial support. CineGouna Platform presents the CineGounaSpringBoard and the CineGouna Bridge as programs that provide opportunities for sharing and learning through workshops, panel discussions, and masterclasses led by industry professionals.
Organized by MAD Solutions in 2015, the Arab Cinema Center (ACC) is a nonprofit organization providing the filmmaking industry with a professional window to connect with their counterparts from all over the world through a number of events that it organizes. The ACC also provides networking opportunities with representatives of companies and institutions specialized in co-production and international distribution, among others. The ACC's activities vary between film markets, stands, and pavilions, networking sessions and one-on-one meetings bringing together Arab and foreign filmmakers, welcome parties, as well as meetings with international organizations and festivals, and the issuance of the Arab Cinema Magazine to be distributed at the leading international film festivals and markets. Furthermore, newsletter subscription is now available on the ACC's website, allowing users to obtain digital copies of the Arab Cinema Magazine, as well as news on the ACC's activities, notifications of application dates for grants, festivals and offers from educational and training institutions, updates on Arab films participating at festivals, exclusive news on the Arab Cinema LAB, and highlights from the ACC's partners and their future projects.
The ACC also launched an English-language Arab Cinema Guide, available on its website, which is a comprehensive cinematic guide that comprises a variety of tools presented collectively for the first time to offer information on Arab cinema to filmmakers inside and outside of the Arab world. It also aims to facilitate filmmakers' access to international markets and help film industry representatives to easily identify Arab film productions.