Directing
How to combine modernity and fundamentalist Islam. "Saudi Solutions" is a unique and revealing documentary about the lifestyles and attitudes of ambitious career womenin conservative Saudi Arabia - the only country in the Arabworld where women are obliged to cover themselves inabayas and aren't allowed to drive cars. Because of the strong influence of fundamentalist Islam on society, filmingis severely restricted in Saudi Arabia. With unique access to the Kingdom, Backlight had the opportunity to film the daily routines of Saudi working women. This documentaryfeatures a top gyneacologist, a TV news anchor woman, a photographer, and a university professor. It also introducesthe wealthy Prince Al-Waleed, who passionately promotes the acceptance of women into the workforce. He kindly invitesBacklight to his luxury desert camp, but there are no women to be found - only thousands of men.
California is a strong brand, the state of new beginnings, dreams and movie stars, of surfers and a wonderful climate. But the Golden State is bankrupt and the city of Los Angeles is running out of cash. Public services are being cut and unemployment keeps rising. At the same time, optimism, entrepreneurship and the belief in the power of America are stronger than ever. In Los Angeles, we meet five people who are going through a transformation in their lives during this crisis. Justin and Christine lost their jobs and are now living in a van with their two young sons. Charles has gotten out of prison after fourteen years. Mizuko prepares her children for the future by making them at ease in virtual reality. Laura has taken advantage of the crisis by buying land cheaply and starting an urban farm and artists collective Fallen Fruit maps the abundant free 'public fruit' available in the city. Who are the pioneers who are reinventing the new America and how do they see the future?
Focusing on the vulnerability of digital data, Digital Amnesia ponders the sustainability of modern artifacts that have no material state. Notable archivists share their perspectives on the Digital Age and whether it poses great promise or threat to the longevity of digital information and our collective memory.
LAGOS / KOOLHAAS follows Koolhaas during his research in Lagos over a period of two years as he wanders through the city, talking with people and recognizing the problems with water, electricity and traffic. But instead of judging the city to be doomed, he is able to interpret this 'culture of congestion' positively, thereby creating a completely new concept of the big city.
Three "electro sensitives" who endure electro-hypersensitivity in Japan, Sweden and the Netherlands share their experiences evading connectivity.
Hiyap and Evenezer were born on a rickety boat on the waves of the Mediterranean sea and grow up in Europe. Filmed in the course of seven years, Tweeling is a surprising and unsettling coming-of-age series about two dynamic boys with the same DNA and their determined Eritrean mother. How do they find their way in the world? And what do we see in the mirror they hold up to us?
What if we could identify the genes for human intelligence? Would a brave new world of improved human beings be waiting for us? The documentary DNA Dreams features a new generation of scientists at BGI, China’s leading genomics research institute. The film follows eighteen-year-old Zhao Bowen, who wants to find the genetic basis of intelligence by analysing the DNA of 2,000 highly gifted children. At BGI’s cloning lab, twenty-five-year-old Lin Lin produces pigs in all shapes and forms. Deeply in love with her work, she feels ‘like a mother’ to the piglets that are conceived under her microscope.
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This project has been developed by documentary filmmaker Bretje van der Haak and designer Silke Wawro in close collaboration with architect Rem Koolhaas, photographer Edgar Cleine, and the Harvard Project on the City. The concept and scenario for Lagos Wide & Close was developed by Van der Haak and Wawro during a masterclass of the Sandberg Institute and Dutch Cultural Media Fund in 2003 and produced by Submarine. The interactive film presents a selection of video and audio of Lagos recorded in 2001. It separates the distant - wide - and the intimate - close - views of the city enabling the viewer to switch between these perspectives interactively. Rather than following a dramatic storyline, it aims to bring the viewer close to the reality of what it means to live and work in Lagos, to move alongside bus driver Olawole Busayo and other Lagosians, and to delve into the city's layered fabric, slowly making sense of the rules, the possibilities, and lifestyles of Lagos.
Every Sunday night, on satellite TV, millions of Arab men and women watch a daring talk show called Kalam Nawaem, which translates as ‘women's talk’ or sweet talk. The MBC show is broadcast once a week in 23 Arab countries, and has some of the highest viewing ratings in the Arab world. Heated discussions on topics such as marriage with foreigners, homosexuality and sex before marriage are interspersed with politics and entertainment. The presenters are independent, articulate women, who have become part of the family in many Arab living rooms. In 2007, we featured this controversial talk show, putting women's rights on the public agenda in the documentary film Satellite Queens. Ten years later, only one of the team of four presenters we filmed ten years ago has remained: Muna Abu Sulayman, who has been the celebrated Saudi co-host of the show for 15 years. New to the show is actress and presenter Nadia Ahmad, a flamboyant media personality from Kuwait.
