Pakistani short film ‘Noor’ wins at Cannes World Film Festival

Noor, a Pakistani short film that tackles the stigma around weak eyesight, won the Best Health Film award in the January online edition of the Cannes World Film Festival. The Umer Adil directorial, featuring Sarwat Gilani and Omair Rana in titular roles, will have its premiere in Cannes.

On Wednesday, Gilani took to Instagram to share the news in a post which she captioned, “We won!” tagging her whole team. The Cannes World Film Festival announced winners for its January online edition on Monday, in a relatively new development in which the jury acknowledges films made under a variety of genres.

All monthly winners automatically enter the annual competition for a chance to receive a prestigious custom-made metal statuette, the Luciole d'Or (Golden Firefly), and an opportunity to have their film screened in Cannes, the cinema capital of the world.

Speaking to Arab News, Adil shared details about his short film. “It [Noor] highlights the impact on kids of not wearing glasses and how that pressure affects their personalities,” he explained. “It’s a very cute story told through the lens of a young girl, Noor. She is a very good student but she faces some issues when her eyesight starts to weaken. Basically, it [Noor] is about the stigma attached to glasses that a person isn’t supposed to wear one or else they would look older,” added Adil.

Noor features a child artist in the lead role and a major concern that Adil had was whether people would watch his film given the industry is star-driven. “The child artist is leading the film so we were wondering what kind of feedback it would receive considering our film industry is star-driven. But we got really good feedback. We got 100,000 organic views initially. People really appreciated it through their comments. It was a good surprise for the platform and for the team,” he exclaimed.

Noor was one of the nominations announced last week through the festival’s official social media handle. The film was released on Pakistani OTT platform SeePrime in January. Scripted by Farah Usman, Noor features Gilani, Rana, Tanisha Shameem, Mizna Waqas and Tasneem Ansari. It was a project by Sightsavers, an organisation that works with school children on their eyesight and provides free screening and glasses. The organisation itself submitted the picture in the health film category at the festival.

Another Pakistani short film, Pehchaan, written, directed and produced by Mohammad Ahsan also made it to the nominations of the January Edition at the Cannes World Film Festival but the film did not make it to the winners' list.

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