LONDON -- Despite hailing from a country where cinemas are banned, Saudi Arabian film execs are certainly keeping themselves busy.
Production has just begun on "Menahi," the second Saudi feature from Prince Waleed Bin Talal's media titan Rotana.
The $2 million pic, helmed by Ayman Makram, is the first bigscreen incarnation of popular Saudi thesp Fayez Al-Maliki's TV persona Menahi, a naive, humble Saudi farmer who often finds himself involved in comic escapades beyond his control.
Pic will center on Menahi getting involved in a get-rich-quick scheme and traveling from his tribal homeland in the conservative kingdom to the booming metropolis of Dubai. Once there, he finds himself unwittingly embraced, a la Peter Sellers in "Being There," as a financial guru.
Laffer will lense in Cairo, Dubai and Riyadh.
"He's a very famous character in Saudi Arabia," says producer Turki Shabanah, who also produced "How Are Things," Rotana's first Saudi feature in 2006. "It's a very funny story and we're looking to give it an international look and feel."
"Menahi" will be the first feature greenlit since former Studio Canal topper Frederic Sichler boarded Rotana as prexy of its film group in January.
That appointment was evidence of Prince Waleed's desire to turn his film division into an international operation.
His ambitions are being matched by an abundance of other film activity by Saudi film execs.
Sheik Waleed Al-Ibrahim's TV net MBC Group is in production on "2The Circle," the first feature launched under its film division. Gulf pic is being produced by Kuwaiti Abdullah Boushahri and helmed by Emirati filmmaker Nawaf Al-Janahi.
Execs at Saudi-owned paybox ART are also ramping up their investment in the Arab film biz.
In addition to inking a three-picture financing deal with Egyptian shingle Misr Intl. Films -- which covers already-released "Chaos" from veteran Egyptian helmer Youssef Chahine; Yousry Nasrallah's "The Aquarium"; and the forthcoming "Dukhan bil ranar," from Lebanese helmer Samir Habchi -- ART execs are set to go into production on "The Kid."
Pic is helmed by well-known Syrian TV director Hatem Ali, who scored one of last Ramadan's biggest hits with "King Farouk," a historical biopic about Egypt's last monarch who was overthrown in 1952 by future prext Gamal Abdel Nasser.
"The Kid," which will be Ali's first Egyptian feature, is about a successful businessman whose son dies. The man immerses himself in his late son's private life only to discover he never really knew him at all. Project is set to start lensing in April.
ART execs have also inked a two picture co-production deal with the Egyptian ministry of culture, which will see the ministry provide coin up to 25% of a project's budget, as well as in-kind support on studio space and use of facilities. The two projects to be made under the deal are yet to be confirmed but are likely to be the latest feature from Egyptian helmer Daoud Abdel Sayed ("A Citizen, a Detective and a Thief") as well as an adaptation of Egyptian writer Fathi Ghanem's celebrated novel "Those Days."
"It's very important that we develop Saudi cinema and allow Saudi talent to emerge," says Rotana prexy Frederic Sichler. "The leader of the Arab film industry has always been Egypt as a source of talent and history but to be a true leader you need to have someone else around to go up against. Otherwise, you're not really a leader. You're just alone."
It's not just on the bigscreen that Saudis are expressing their cinematic talent. Some citizens are using video as a tool of social protest. Wajeha Al-Huwaider has posted a video of herself at the wheel of a car on the popular vidclip site in defiance of official restrictions on women driving in the country.
"For women to drive is not a political issue," says Wajeha as she drives. "It is not a religious issue. It is a social issue, and we know that many women of our society are capable of driving cars."
It remains to be seen whether the clip will be one of the shorts selected for Saudi Arabia's first official film fest to be held later this year. The five-day event, organized by the government-sponsored Dammam Literary Club along with the Saudi society of Arts and Culture, kicks off May 20 and will include screenings of shorts and docs from around the Gulf.
Not everyone is convinced by the idea, though.
"A film festival when you have no theaters? That's silly," says one Saudi film producer. "Where will they show the films? In the toilet."
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