Maryam is an ambitious young doctor working in a small-town clinic in Saudi Arabia. After she is prevented from travelling to Dubai in search of a better job, a bureaucratic mix-up leads her to stumble upon the application for her local city elections, and she decides to run as a candidate. While she faces the restriction of women’s traditional roles in the Kingdom at every turn, Maryam’s audacious candidacy starts to build momentum and challenges her conservative community.

14 Feb (Fri): 7.30pm (By Invitation only),

19 Feb (Wed): 9.10pm

Tunisia, summer 2011. A family holiday to southern Tunisia ends in disaster for Fares, Meriem and their 10-year-old son Aziz when he is accidentally shot in a terrorist ambush. His injury will change their lives as Aziz needs a liver transplant, which leads to the discovery of a long-buried secret. Will Aziz and the couple’s relationship survive?

15 Feb (Sat): 4.00pm

16 Feb (Sun): 1.30pm

Yoram, a 50-year-old veterinarian living in Tel Aviv, is forced to re-examine his relationship with his adolescent daughter Roni after she wishes to end her life. He decides to take her on a journey to visit her mother’s family, setting off a process of self and mutual discovery in the primordial desert land enveloping the Dead Sea.

16 Feb (Sun): 4.30pm

19 Feb (Wed): 7.00pm

Amine steals a big bag of money and escapes into the hills with the police hot on his heels. Before he is arrested, he digs a grave to bury the cash and disguises it as a modest tomb. Years later, he is released from prison and sets off to find his money. However, a religious shrine honouring an unknown saint has been built directly over the place he buried his cash. With his loot now hidden in a holy place, retrieving it suddenly becomes much more complicated.

16 Feb (Sun): 6.45pm

18 Feb (Tue): 9.15pm

Algeria, the 1990s. Nedjma, an 18-year-old student passionate about fashion design, refuses to let the tragic events of the Algerian Civil War keep her from experiencing a normal life and going out at night with her friend Wassila. As the social climate becomes more conservative, she rejects the new bans set by the radicals and decides to fight for her freedom and independence by putting on a fashion show.

15 Feb (Sat): 6.45pm (Begins with a Pre-screening Cultural Talk)

17 Feb (Mon): 9.15pm

Three sisters, Reyhan, Nurhan and Havva are reunited in the remote mountain village where they grew up with their father, after living as besleme (foster child and maid) with their foster parents in the city. All three desire to return to the city as soon as possible, whether this could be achieved depends on their tactics of solidarity, competition, and on the decisions of the men around them.

15 Feb (Sat): 9.30pm

18 Feb (Tues): 6.50pm

In the late 1980s, 15-year-old Qodrat lives on the streets of Kabul and sells cinema tickets on the black market. A big Bollywood fan, he daydreams himself into some of his favourite movie scenes. One day, the police take him to the Soviet orphanage. But in Kabul, the political situation is changing. Qodrat and all the children want to defend their home.

14 Feb (Fri): 9.15pm

17 Feb (Mon): 7.00pm