‘The Mangrove House’ and ‘Oug’: The Two Emirati Films at SIFF

Two Emirati features are competing at the 13th Sharjah International Film Festival for Children and Youth: Khalid Al Mahmood's musical “The Mangrove House” and Abdulrahman Al Madani's family drama “Oug.” They are the only Emirati films in competition.

“The Mangrove House” opened the festival as its opening film. Al Mahmood pitched the project at SIFF's inaugural Film Pitching Session last year while seeking post-production support, and FANN – Media Discovery Platform, the festival's parent organization, came aboard to back the film. “Oug” marks Al Madani's third film at SIFF, after “Nagafa” in 2015 and “Laymoon” in 2019.

What happened to the UAE's festival ecosystem?

Both filmmakers trace a local industry that has cycled through boom and collapse. Al Mahmood made his first film as a university student in the United States in 1999, then returned to a UAE where filmmaking was virtually nonexistent. Annual screenings of local films, later formalized as the Emirates Film Competition, became, in his words, “a school where we came together and critiqued our films.”

“More and more festivals popped up,” he said, including the Dubai International Film Festival and the Abu Dhabi Film Festival.

Al Madani entered the industry shortly before much of that infrastructure vanished. He recalls the “privilege” of abundant platforms before “the plug was pulled, and then we didn't know where to go next.” The Abu Dhabi Film Festival remains defunct. Dubai, which held its last edition in 2017, is set to return in December 2027.

The loss pushed his generation abroad. Over the following decade he made shorts that traveled internationally, an experience he calls a “wake-up call” against relying solely on platforms at home.

Institutional support is now growing. “Oug” received a grant from the UAE Ministry of Culture, a shift from what Al Madani describes as a period of virtually “zero support.”

“We have a long way to go, but I think this is a good start,” he said. “People feel like they can go and apply somewhere [local] to get funding.”

Al Mahmood is less satisfied. Much of the UAE's film infrastructure, he argues, still serves international productions rather than local filmmakers. “What's missing to me is just the infrastructure to be able to make films in the country,” he said.

Who screens Emirati films after the festival?

Distribution remains the structural gap. This year Al Madani launched Meylas Aflam, a screening initiative giving Emirati shorts a life beyond their first festival run.

“We screen our film once, then what?” he asked. Meylas Aflam has held four sold-out screenings this year, with audiences staying for discussions running as long as an hour.

The response counters what Al Madani calls a “misconception that our audience is not prepared for our stories.” His films on YouTube have drawn millions of views, with viewers responding to local stories “told truthfully, and without sugarcoating.”

Inside the two films

“The Mangrove House” follows two deaf brothers and their sister raising money for a competition. Writer and editor Ayesha Alameri originated the project; her brother is deaf and her family uses sign language at home.

Al Mahmood expected a conventional disability narrative. “Usually the stories are all sad, and it's going to be a sob story,” he recalled. Instead, the screenplay drew him by refusing pity: “There's no pity. I didn't feel like they were anything less than any other character.”

Alameri's 23-page screenplay sat between short and feature length, so Al Mahmood concentrated one section and proposed a musical. Local instruments, clothing and songs playing with fish names anchor the film in the UAE. “I always felt like I need to introduce something from this part of the world, something that's rooted here,” he said.

“Oug” — the title translates as “the defect” — examines the blame directed at women whose marriages have not produced children. Set largely during an IKEA shopping trip, it follows a couple, played by Sarra'a Abdulaziz and Yaser Al Neyadi, in confrontation with the husband's mother, played by Huda Al Ghanem.

“I wanted it to be completely in a public setting,” Al Madani explained. “They are fighting, but they have to remain composed also. So I felt like it makes it much stronger.”

At the Odense Film Festival in Denmark, where “Oug” premiered last year, audiences expressed surprise that its hijab-wearing women were dominant personalities. “I was not trying to break stereotypes,” Al Madani said. “I'm just portraying the truth of my environment, and somehow that broke so many stereotypes.”

What comes next?

Both filmmakers now aim for features. Al Mahmood has an early-stage project he calls “very artistic.” Al Madani has spent the past year writing a feature screenplay and names funding as the main obstacle.

“This is my seventh short film. So I am ready,” he said. “My next project has to be a feature.” He added: “There's a community of filmmakers who have done countless short films, and we need to move on to the next step.”

Whether the renewed institutional support can carry that community past the short film stage will define the UAE industry's next decade.