At this year’s Cairo International Airport, Iraqi filmmaker Zara Ghandour’s Film Festival reached a notable milestone with the documentary “Fulana,” which centers on the lived realities of Iraqi women. After its world premiere in Toronto, the film arrived in Cairo as part of the Arab Film Horizon Competition. The film is not only a promising debut, but also a rare piece of Iraqi cinema that focuses on stories shaped by women living in the country and often sidelined or silenced.
Ghandour’s path to filmmaking began more than a decade ago, not in film school, but on Iraqi television. When she was just 20 years old, she began hosting and eventually directing the popular documentary 52 Minutes. This show is what she now calls “Fundamentals.” She traveled the country weekly to cover social issues such as early marriage, domestic violence, unequal laws and women’s prisons, but her stories were so pervasive that colleagues and viewers alike joked that she only covered “women’s issues.” But for Ghandour, these were not “women’s issues” but systemic realities that Iraqi women faced every day. “There were endless subjects to cover,” she recalls. “And I loved it. I went everywhere in Iraq because of this show.”
However, although she appeared in several independent Iraqi films, she felt that none of them achieved enough results. “They were all about complex women, but none of them were written or directed by women,” she points out. When she began working on “Flana” in 2018, she realized she could no longer hide behind other women’s stories without confronting her own. Growing up, she recalls being treated as “lesser than” her brother. Not from older brothers, but by a society structured to glorify boys at the expense of girls. “I felt there was a lack of truth in not telling the stories I knew best,” she recalls. “Everything is connected.”
“Khurana” begins with Ghandur desperately searching for his childhood friend Noor. Noor’s disappearance 20 years ago still haunts her. The research extends to unearthing the systemic violence faced by Iraqi women, from patriarchal traditions to the country’s unresolved legal failures surrounding honor killings. For Ghandour, the personal becomes a rallying cry. “If these personal matters are not dealt with in a fair manner, they become political,” she argues. “People must continue to shout in the streets to stop girls from being thrown into the streets, to stop criminals from killing their wives and daughters, and to pass just laws.”
But bringing that truth to the screen required not only artistic clarity, but constant strategy and immense risk. Ghandour speaks candidly about the fears that accompanied the project from the beginning. “Sometimes I’m scared of the physical reaction,” she admitted, pointing to fears of retaliation. She was more nervous about the Arab premiere in Cairo than in Toronto. “Because of the mindset of this society, there were a lot of Iraqis in the audience, so I was nervous about what kind of reaction there would be.”
Her concerns come from experience. When she has spoken publicly about gender violence in the past, she has been accused of “destroying Iraq’s image,” as if acknowledging injustice was a betrayal rather than a demand for accountability. “There are a lot of negative opinions in society,” she laments. “People take it personally because they haven’t done anything about it.”
During production, she often had to lie to authorities in order to film safely and submit a false synopsis in which an empowered Iraqi woman gets the chance. In private homes, birth rooms, and shelters, the women who allowed her to photograph her trusted her with their identities and, in some cases, their lives. Several women initially refused to appear on camera, but one changed her mind after building a rapport with Ghandour. Still, director Ghandour made the difficult decision to remove all the characters from the film if he feared for their safety. In some cases, key figures were excluded because publishing their stories could expose them to retaliation.
However, the heart of the film focuses on the two women. Ghandour’s aunt, a midwife whose home has become a shelter, and Natalie, also known by the pseudonym Leila, reveal the human cost of Iraq’s legal vacuum for women in their experiences of shelter and domestic violence. Both women have seen the movie. Ghandour’s aunt gave an emotional and encouraging response, but Natalie was shocked to see herself on screen, aware that she needed reconstructive surgery to repair her jaw, which was injured in the assault. The team is currently helping raise funds for this operation.
The film’s title refers to the erasure that Ghandur is fighting against. In Iraq, she explains, “Fulani” is a term used to describe women whose names are forgotten or whose names are forgotten or ignored “as if they weren’t worth mentioning.” She intentionally turned it into a name, a being.
Internationally, “Fulana” comes at a time when Arab female directors are receiving unprecedented attention. Ghandur, who just screened the film at IDFA, is clearly aware of this momentum. “Women are working on more films and getting the opportunities they deserve,” she observes. The film comes amid a small but significant change in Iraq. The country issued its first-ever public film fund this year, allowing young filmmakers from the 1980s and 1990s generation to make their way without formal film schools or established industry infrastructure.
However, “Franá” is unique. This film is the first Iraqi film made by and about women living in Iraq. “For me, that was more important than getting selected for a big festival,” she says. “This is a spot on the road, one of many spots, but it’s getting noticed.”
Cairo was an unexpected turning point. “I didn’t think people would be interested,” she recalls of the film’s sold-out screening at the Opera House. “When that theater was fully completed, something changed in me. It gave me faith in Fulani and Arab audiences.”
Next, Ghandour is planning a premiere in Iraq, a national tour of the film in towns without movie theaters, and a companion book of essays, poems, and comics inspired by the film. Broadcasters across the region are in talks. Al Jazeera, for example, has expressed interest.
But deep down, Mr. Ghandour hopes that Fulana will spark something simpler and more pressing. It is a path to refuge, honor killings, and reflection on the everyday atrocities faced by women across Iraq, and even responsibility.
“This experience taught me that I can do more and keep trying,” she concluded. “And to those who seek to undermine us, we know exactly what we are doing.”
