From the cotton fields in the Sudanese countryside, to the war-weary streets of Khartoum, “Hay Cinema” in Jeddah is taking its audience, during the current month of November, on two cinematic trips to Sudan, through the two films; The novelist “The Cotton Queen” and the documentary “Khartoum”, which present two different images of Sudanese society, in which questions of memory, identity and social transformations intersect with the destinies of individuals, in a program that highlights Sudanese cinema.
The screening of the two films comes after their participation in prominent international film festivals, as part of a program that also includes the Palestinian film “Once Upon a Time in Gaza,” and a French work that restores the beginnings of rap music in the suburbs of Paris, according to the program of screenings this month that “Cinema Hay” announced on its website.
A tale from the countryside
In “The Cotton Queen,” director Susanna Mirghani combines a story of growing up and self-discovery with the extended impact of colonial history. Mirghani recorded a historic achievement as the first Sudanese woman to direct a film to be shown at the 82nd session of the Venice International Film Festival.
The events of “The Cotton Queen” take place in a Sudanese village that depends on cotton cultivation, where the girl “Nafisa” lives a simple life between harvesting the crop and learning from her grandmother, before a young Sudanese businessman arrives who threatens to change the family’s lifestyle upside down. The 93-minute film is a joint production between Sudan, Germany, France, Palestine, Egypt, Qatar and Saudi Arabia, and is shown for the first time in the Kingdom, with screenings continuing until December 5.
Khartoum and survivor stories
In contrast to the rural life depicted by “The Cotton Queen,” the documentary film “Khartoum” transports the viewer to a different reality, where the stories of five people are intertwined trying to continue their lives in a war-torn country. The work monitors the dreams and daily challenges of its characters, in light of political turmoil and the struggle for freedom and survival, approaching the impact of war on the lives of individuals and its repercussions on their ambitions and future.
The documentary is signed by a group of directors: Anas Saeed, Raya Al-Hajj, Ibrahim Snoopy, Taima Ahmed, Youssef Juba, and Philip Cox, in a collective directing experience that brings together multiple visions about the city and its residents. The film was previously shown at the Sundance Film Festival, as well as at the 75th session of the Berlin International Film Festival in 2025, before arriving to the Saudi audience in exclusive screenings that continue until the beginning of next month.
The two films present two different images of Sudan. One restores rural life and the population's relationship with the land and traditions, and the other is concerned with the repercussions of war on the lives of individuals. Although the two styles differ between narrative drama and documentary cinema, they are united by interest in the transformations witnessed by Sudanese society, and their repercussions on the fates of its characters.
Gaza and black comedy
From Sudan to Palestine, the program shows the film “Once Upon a Time in Gaza,” directed by the two brothers Tarzan and Arab Nasser, which won the “Best Direction” award in the “Un Certain Regard” section during the 78th session of the Cannes Film Festival in 2025.
The events of the film revolve around “Yahya”, who develops a friendship between him and “Osama”, the owner of a restaurant, which leads them to work together in selling drugs while delivering orders, before things become complicated following a confrontation with a corrupt policeman. The film mixes drama and black comedy, and it is shown for the first time in the Kingdom as part of the “Live Cinema” program, with its showings continuing until next December 5.
French rebellious music
As for French cinema, it will be present through the film “Supreme” by director Audrey Estrogo, as part of the “Monthly Film Club Screenings” of the “French Cultural Institute” at “Cinema Hay”. The film returns to France in the early nineties, when tensions escalated between the police and youth in the suburbs of Paris, and hip-hop music emerged as a means of expressing anger and social protest. Through the biography of the two young men, Joey Starr and Cole Sheen, the work recalls the emergence of the band Supreme NTM, which became one of the most prominent French rap groups and the voice of a generation that found in music a space to express its reality. The film was previously shown at the 74th Cannes Film Festival in 2021, and combines drama and musical biography, recalling a period that witnessed social and cultural transformations in France.
Researchers in Italy have developed an innovative polymeric membrane that may pave the way for the manufacture of batteries that do not rely on lithium, are non-flammable, and have the theoretical ability to store energy equivalent to about twice what traditional lithium-ion batteries store, which opens the door to a new generation of safer and more sustainable batteries.
The innovation came at the hands of a research team from the Department of Chemistry, Materials Science and Engineering at the Polytechnic University of Milan. The researchers succeeded in designing a semi-rigid, non-flammable gel membrane that allows fluoride ions to move inside the battery at room temperature. The results of the study were published on Friday in the journal Energy Storage Materials.
The most notable achievement of the researchers is the development of a membrane that allows the use of fluoride ions instead of lithium ions to transfer electrical charges inside batteries, which may reduce dependence on lithium, whose extraction and processing requires natural resources and industrial processes that have an environmental impact. Fluoride batteries, which are still under development, are characterized by the possibility of relying on materials that are more abundant in nature compared to lithium, as well as their lower risk of combustion, which may make them a promising option for renewable energy storage systems.
The study's lead researcher, Maurizio Sansottera, from the Polytechnic University of Milan, said that the production of renewable energy sources peaks at times that do not necessarily coincide with periods of high consumption, which makes energy storage necessary to ensure that it can be used when needed. He added on the university's website that European countries are working to develop systems to store electricity generated from renewable sources, but the spread of these systems still faces challenges, including the fire risks associated with traditional batteries. He explained that the new polymeric membrane is non-flammable, which reduces the risk of fires, in addition to its reliance on an element that is widely available in nature.
Multiple advantages
The advantages of the new technology are not limited to enhancing safety, but may also allow the production of lighter batteries that are more capable of storing energy. According to the researchers, the theoretical energy density of these batteries can reach about 600 watt-hours per kilogram, compared to about 150 to 250 watt-hours per kilogram in traditional lithium-ion batteries.
The researchers indicated that achieving this density may allow electric cars to travel distances up to twice what they currently travel on a single charge, although this remains a possibility linked to the possibility of reaching these levels in practical batteries. Potential applications of this technology may not be limited to electric cars, but also include energy storage systems, drones, satellites, and aircraft.
An important advantage of the new membrane is that it allows the transfer of fluoride ions at room temperature, without the need to preheat the battery to improve the movement of ions inside it. The researchers explained that previous generations of fluoride-ion batteries required temperatures ranging between 100 and 150 degrees Celsius to enhance ionic conduction, which led to the consumption of part of the stored energy in the form of heat.
They concluded that this development represents an important step towards developing a new generation of batteries that combines high energy density, greater safety, and reduced dependence on lithium, with prospects for future use in the sectors of transportation, aviation, and renewable energy storage.
Girls with big heads and wide eyes, who made the Japanese artist Yoshitomo Nara one of the most popular artists of the twenty-first century, are now present almost everywhere, if one knows where to look for them, according to the American “CNN”.
These characters can be found on T-shirts and skateboards, in the form of labels adorning water bottles, or in the artist's monumental sculptural works that occupy striking spaces. They can also be found drawn with confident, sharp lines executed by the artist himself on the walls of a modest bar in Manhattan that he visited in 2009.
Angry, spiteful, quarrelsome, bored, and confused... Nara's characters seem mysterious, but at the same time they are articulate and easy to read. It combines the artist's distinctive visual style with her remarkable ability to convey emotions and influence the recipient.
Today, Nara's figures continue to break new ground, with a retrospective of his work at David Zwirner Gallery, his first major solo exhibition in New York City in nearly a decade.
The exhibition coincides with another exhibition of his works at the Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden in Washington, D.C., and includes a group of new works that have never been shown before, along with older works.
The exhibits range from tiny drawings on torn scraps of paper to huge, colorful portraits, whose glowing eyes seem to follow the visitor wherever he moves in the hall.
On the opening night of the Zwirner exhibition, Thursday, the artist’s fans lined up for more than an hour, in a line that extended two streets, while some of them carried umbrellas to protect themselves from the rain.
The audience was mostly young people, who seemed very interested in fashion and style; The bags were not devoid of “Labobo” dolls hanging from them, which are characters that also feature large eyes that, to some extent, evoke Nara’s artistic style, as well as ballet shoes with a distinctive “Tabi” design.
A few stops away on the subway, at the “Niagara” bar located in the East Village neighborhood, on whose walls Nara left his drawings more than a decade ago, fans flocked in succession on visits resembling artistic pilgrimages, whether before or after the opening of the exhibition, according to one of the bar’s employees.
There, visitors discovered a group of expressive drawings depicting Nara characters enthusiastically playing music. Today, these drawings are protected behind plastic panels.
