The Red Sea International Film Festival announced today the 12 selected projects at the first edition of the Red Sea Film Development Laboratory, selected by an international committee from 120 projects from 16 countries. One-third of the projects were selected for Arab female directors, and more than a quarter with the participation of Arab female producers. The selected works also included six Saudi film projects, in addition to six Arab projects from Jordan, Egypt, Palestine, Iraq and Lebanon, reflecting the program's efforts to support the local and Arab film industry. Participants in the program are competing for two funding grants to produce two projects worth half a million dollars each, with the opportunity to present the two winning projects as a premiere at the second edition of the Red Sea International Film Festival in 2021. The selected projects join the lab in an integrated program of three workshops held in collaboration with "Torino Film Lab" in Historic Jeddah under the supervision of international experts in the fields of directing, photography, sound and editing. The first workshop will start in October 2019 and will conclude on the sidelines of the Red Sea International Film Festival in March 2020.
