Asked in writing whether she could discuss the situation facing Afghan filmmakers after the Taliban’s reclamation of power last weekend, Diana Saqeb Jamal declines succinctly. “My only thought is we are f***ed. Sorry.”
The director, whose short film “Roqaia” (pictured) screened in Venice’s 2019 Horizons section, has been in Canada for months.
A visit to family there was prolonged by the pandemic, but she’d already booked her ticket back to Kabul and was planning a long shoot for a new documentary about women’s rights in a remote village near Iran.The Taliban’s abrupt take-over of Kabul on Sunday simply did not compute, despite weeks spent so worried she couldn’t eat or sleep. Her friends and family were in the city; her camera, equipment, hard drives and clothes were still in her apartment.
Just two summers ago, the 80-seat Ai Khanum cinema she helped to build opened and hosted an inaugural festival of around 100 films. Older women wept — it was their first time in a movie theater in decades.
Source: Afghan Female Directors Fear the End of Filmmaking Under Taliban – Variety