Discoveries from Jordan World Cinema

An elderly woman waking up on a cold morning in November next to her dear husband to realize that her whole life will never be the same again.

Laila runs away from a life of disconnection and emptiness abroad, she wants her old world back in Amman. Yet 14 years changed everything. Unannounced and uninvited, her attempts to construct a new life turn out to be much harder than she thought.

Wandering through the worst zoo in the World, a young boy Sami is looking for his football. The loner finds more than that when he bargained for when he encounters the little tiger Laziz, who follows him on his quest to find a safe place to play. Against all odds, they become friends. But the remnants of war harbor danger.

Based on the experience of Palestinian storyteller Denise Asaad in preserving the oral Palestinian folktale as a form of preserving the identity of the Palestinian people who were dispersed inside and outside Palestine, and her attempts to blend the traditional Palestinian folktale with modern tales of aspects of Palestinian life and their struggle against the Israeli occupation, which is still working to obliterate the Palestinian identity.

A visceral action-thriller where a lone fighter is forced into a relentless pursuit by a grim ancestral decree. To satisfy a blood mandate that haunts his family's legacy, he must cut through a web of enemies and shifting alliances. As the hunt intensifies, the line between justice and revenge blurs in a raw struggle for survival.

More Sugar is an intimate and emotionally charged drama that follows Malak, a woman in her mid-thirties, as she navigates the suffocating grip of depression and anxiety. Living alone in a small apartment, Malak struggles to maintain a facade of normalcy while secretly battling thoughts of suicide. Her life takes a turn when her brother, Hamouda, unexpectedly visits her one evening, unaware of the turmoil she is hiding.

When 40-year-old Amir visits his ailing father in hospital intending to reveal a long held secret, the nature of their dysfunctional relationship gets in the way. As the two men battle out their differences, the tension mounts on Amir who finally withdraws and leaves. Blinded by rage and his galloping emotions, Amir finds himself stuck between guilt and a desperate need to race back to his father before it's too late.

The Parrot tells the story of a Mizrahi Jewish family, who emigrate from Morocco, trying to settle into their new life in Haifa, Palestine in 1948.

On the eve of his most personal play, Khalid, a struggling theater director, seeks escape in drugs and solitude. His night is disrupted by a low-ranking police officer sent to write a report about the performance. What begins as routine spirals into a surreal night of hazy focus, uneasy conversation, and unexpected connection. As boundaries blur and confessions surface, the two men, each quietly battling his own collapse, discover in each other a reflection they didn't expect, and a mirror they can't ignore.

Sami and Mahmoud are getting ready to carry out their detailed plan on a typical day inside one of Amman's malls to steal an unusual gift from a lingerie store so that Sami can give it to his girlfriend. However, they failed to consider the store owners, who could have thwarted their plans.

During the occupation of Palestine in 1948, Ahmad, a 17-year-old Palestinian boy, faces a war in his hometown that forces him to give up his dream of being a professional footballer.

The events revolve around a group of Arab characters from different countries, who come together and show many problems and obstacles that stand between Arabs and each other

bombs like fireworks, the artifice of televised war in a soft, black sky, perforations of light in the film’s velvet for any serious reflection the sidereal Consider in memory of the fallen in Gaza, the stars.

Ramy is a peaceful teenager who enjoys his skates, playing cards, and a few cigarettes with his friends. He lives in a humble neighborhood where manhood and violence go hand-in-hand. One day, as he jokes around with his friends out on the street, his words are mistaken for an insult by the local gangster. Events escalate when tit-for-tat violence ensues. The Amman district’s compacted hills, streets, and alleys tell the story of how fragile safety and stability can be in the shadows of anger and revenge.

At a crowded airport, Ahlam, a 14-year-old mother, is running away from Baghdad, the only place she’s ever known. As she fights the shadows lurking around her, she reflects on her journey to reclaim her life.

A testimony of love dedicated to the sea of Gaza, its stories, myths, and heroes. In two parallel timelines, it follows the journey of a Palestinian rowing champion striving to achieve her dream and the story of a fisherman and marine rescuer who has spent his life by the Gaza Sea.

An old man who lost everything in war suddenly finds a new reason to live and rebuild.

Samia — a young aspiring dancer — is diagnosed with cancer and, after undergoing treatment, begins the tough journey of mental and physical changes that cause her to withdraw from life and isolate herself. Her illness also takes its toll on her husband Samir, who tries to support her, but she pushes him away. When Samir notices that music still attracts Samia’s attention, he tries to use it to lift her spirit and bring her out of her isolation.

Language is political in this subtle short film that shows an unnamed man in Amman, Jordan repeating decontextualized political English words all include the letter P - a letter that doesn't exist in the Arabic language and pronouncing it is coded socially and economically.

In besieged Gaza, where the existence of Kentucky survives only as legend, Anwar transforms the masses’ craving into a successful smuggling venture, while single‑handedly deepening the emotional wound between himself and his father.

Movie Details

A girl and a goldfish find themselves in an empty room in a war zone. As danger approaches, the isolated girl increasingly uses her imagination to distract herself. Why doesn’t she leave the room?

a man helps a little kid find his mother but it turns out that the kid is a slum rat thief

A young Palestinian promises his father on his deathbed to climb the highest mountain in the world. Despite wonderful nature experiences and new friendships, it becomes a dramatic trip to the limits of his own life.

Revolutionary Palestinian film.

Revolutionary Palestinian film.

Tells the story of a group of exguerrillas (Fedayeen) who were active members in the Palestinian Revolution Movement during different stages of the struggle. Many wounded guerrillas reside today in Jordan where they have suffered from poverty, neglect and a certain "amnesia" amongst others regarding the sacrifices and heroism entailed in their contributions to the struggle. Sandra Madi's heartbreaking film shows that the journey from revered images of freedom fighters upholding a just cause, to those of dejected elderly men in worn clothing, perhaps physically or mentally disabled, seems short indeed. Perforated Memory asks how the political events and personal narratives contributing to collective memory have been deformed to arrive at this tragic forgetfulness.

At Salt’s historic boys’ school, five teens begin their final year as war intensifies in Gaza. Caught between the familiarity of tradition and the pull of digital transformation, they come of age amid rising tensions and a shifting sense of stability. As the outside world seeps into their everyday lives, they search for connection, identity, and hope in a time when growing up feels both accelerated and uncertain.

In 1938 Levant region, Fadia, grieving the loss of her parents, turns to her cousin for solace. Against her will, Fadia becomes trapped in an asylum while her cousin seizes her inheritance, depriving her of even her right to grieve.

A meditation on love and longing - the love of family and longing for home, contemplated through overcoming the trauma of losing the family home and forced migration, transforming the regrets of a lifetime into a journey of healing, creative catharsis and witnessing

Actress Maisa Abd Elhadi was shot while protesting in 2021. This short reimagines the moment the actress danced with the forces and through creativity removed all obstacles, for herself and those before and after her. This film is led by actress/dancer Maisa Abd Elhadi who was shot in the leg in May 2021 in Haifa while protesting peacefully against Palestinian home demolition. It is made with the leaders of the Palestinian circus, whose members have been persecuted and detained. The director has also been targeted as she protested peacefully. We continue to make and change history through creativity that never dies.

To avert a predetermined fate, twelve-year-old Yasmin and her older sister Ahlam escape beyond the boundaries set by their father, defying an enemy that lies within in order to reach a mythical sea.

An intimate story of a three-generational Palestinian Bedouin family and their animals on the outskirts of Amman, Jordan, as relentless development reshapes their world. Facing eviction, displacement and an uncertain future, they struggle to survive in an environment that is becoming increasingly uninhabitable and unrecognizable.

A young woman tries to help her mother overcome the absence of her son, only to realize that the depth of her grief is too strong to reconcile.

Hind is a young karate athlete with a hearing disability. One day, after she is subjected to abusive behaviour at the training centre, her world becomes distorted. Hind must find a way to reclaim her power.

In this short, a pop-up techno club ambushes the streets of downtown Amman flooding a conservative neighborhood with heavy bass and unfamiliar faces.

During a scorching hot summer’s day in Amman, a man prepares for a special meeting.

A romantic comedy about a love story between Jordanian Monaliza, and Egyptian Hamdi, set in present day Amman among a community of nosy stereotypes and quirky characters.

Two estranged brothers find themselves in the untamed wilderness as they embark on a journey to bury their father. Reunited in the wake of tragedy after years of tense separation

A Palestinian family in Jerusalem contend with the risk of forced displacement.

Two herds of sheep, one with curly wool and the other with straight wool. They speak different languages, MAA and BAA. They live separated from each other and none of them dared to meet anyone from the other side. They both believe that the other ones have deadly dangerous wool. But the curiosity of two newborn sheep leads them to each other and after a scary meeting, they realize that they are just the same, except that they have different hair styles.

Revolutionary Palestinan film.

A devastating airstrike shatters a family's life in Gaza. The pregnant wife and her son survive -- along with her husband's head, severed from his body. Confronting this surreal reality, they navigate an unbearable loss while clinging to fragile hope. Together, they embark on a haunting journey of survival, love, and the will to rebuild a life torn apart by tragedy.

Plot details under wraps but "aims to fuse high-octane action with comedy while celebrating cultural diversity across its Middle Eastern and Taiwanese settings".

Aziz, a young Arab actor in New York City, wrestles with the haunting echoes of his past while serving as an understudy in a production of the Greek tragedy Hecuba. Days before the premiere, he is thrust into the spotlight, and rehearsals become a fragile dance between memory and reality. Shadows of his childhood in a war-torn homeland resurface—memories of a lost twin brother, Ahmad, and an orange grove torn apart by conflict. As Aziz delves deeper into his role, his own anguish bleeds into the performance. The play’s director sees a rare, unguarded truth in Aziz’s portrayal, unaware of the profound personal wounds that lie beneath it. On opening night, Aziz’s grief and guilt transform his performance into a raw, cathartic journey. Through the act of storytelling, he confronts the fractured pieces of his identity, merging the past with the present and finding a bittersweet peace in honoring his brother’s memory.

In a satirical comedy framework, the events of the play deal with the political and economic situation in the State of Jordan, its relationship with neighboring countries and the impact of global political and economic events on the reality of life in general

Through the character of Abu Saqr, the great artist "Musa Hijazin" presents many social issues and political situations in a comedic way

Despite limitations, a group of young artists in Gaza form a rap band. Through their words and music, they express longing for change and a better life.

Children express their experiences of war and diaspora through drawings and testimonials.

The desert is often mobilised in science fiction films to simulate worlds ravaged by resource depletion and climate change or outer worlds hostile to life. A visual filter applied to the landscape intensifies the conventional perception of the desert, accentuates that technological representation of nature and nature itself are inseparable from man-made transformation. Ghostly entanglement of deep time, unsettling present and imagined future haunt the landscape, the film unfolds into a bizarre interplanetary journey that oscillates between documentary and climate fiction, nature and artificial, life and non-life.

Firas, a Jordanian-Lebanese nine-year-old visits Jordan for the first time in nine years to renew his passport. After constantly feeling like a stranger in Lebanon, (where he lived all his life) he is convinced that he'd finally feel at home in Jordan. Through a series of dramedic events, it becomes clear that the two neighboring countries are worlds apart. Determined to fit in, Firas must go to extreme lengths to prove that he can finally belong.

A journey of three young students running for the students councils in UNRWA school in Jordan, from announcing the election till the end of the academic year.

Corner Store is about family, community and patience, told through the eyes of a man who has spent 10 years living the back of his store, working long, hard days while waiting to bring his family to San Francisco from their native Palestine.

When an artist's carefully ordered world begins to fracture - brushes vanish, doors lock unexpectedly - she must unravel her daughter's lies to confront a truth that could shatter them both.

A film by The Palestinian Cultural Club. In Beddawi refugee camp, a young Palestinian weighs escape via “death boats” as loss, love, and community tensions push him toward a fateful choice.

A political comedy play, which satirically deals with the political and economic events and conditions in the Arab countries after the idea of the new world order announced by US President George H.W. Bush

Filmed entirely with an iPhone, Teta, Opi & Me is a tribute to conformity, tolerance and courage. It is a poetic, meditative, multilingual, and feeling-driven short film, documenting the intricacies of the artist’s playful process in capturing her grandparents’ enduring romance through social, political and racial adversity. He comes from Bethlehem, Palestine and she comes from Vienna, Austria. Incorporating poetic filmic scenarios, vérité scenes, interviews, and home movies, the work is an inter-generational dialogue that explores themes of family, love, and the intermingling of cultures.

Movie by Ali al ghazouli

Two Palestinian refugee women from different generations are connected through traditional embroidery. Between Al-Baqa’a refugee camp and Amman, stitching becomes a way to preserve memory, express identity and pass stories from one generation to the next.

Ala'a is a high-achieving university student, torn between ambition and suppressed desire. When his friend Yazan draws him into a momentary escape through prostitution, their decision spirals into a harrowing trap of blackmail and guilt. As consequences close in, Ala'a is forced to confront the darkness behind his choices, and the cost of crossing the line.