Saudi Producer Mohammed Al-Turki Steps Down as CEO of the Red Sea Film Foundation
Saudi producer Mohammed Al-Turki is stepping down as CEO of Saudi Arabia’s Red Sea Film Foundation, the parent organization of Saudi’s top fest, which is the leading market in the region and a key driver in the kingdom’s ongoing efforts to build a film and TV industry.
Al-Turki, who remains on board as an adviser, will return to focusing on “personal projects and his career as an independent film producer and businessman,” a Red Sea foundation statement said.
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While the selection of his successor is underway, Mohammed Asseri, who is a former Red Sea Film Foundation board member, will step in during the interim as the foundation’s acting CEO.
Last month, Saudi Arabia landed its first movie in Cannes Film Festival’s official selection with “Norah,” a drama by pioneering director Tawfik Alzaidi set in 1990s Saudi, when conservatism was at its height. The film premiered locally at the Red Sea Film Festival last December.
“We celebrated a watershed moment in Cannes with the screening of ‘Norah,’ which was a milestone both for the Foundation and for Saudi cinema as a whole,” said Jomana Alrashid, chairwoman of the Red Sea Film Foundation, in the statement. “As we leave the Cannes Film Festival on a high, we look back at the past three years and the building blocks that have been worked on relentlessly by the team at Red Sea Film Foundation and share our gratitude for Mohammed Al-Turki, who played a key role in leading the team and the Foundation to where it is today.”
Commented Al-Turki: “Working with the foundation on these three editions of the festival and cementing Saudi Arabia’s place on the global stage of the film industry has been an honor and a privilege. We have achieved so much, and ahead of our fourth edition we are in a position we could only have dreamed of a few years ago, which is why I feel now is the perfect time to transition.”
He added, “I am grateful for the ties we have built as a team and will continue to support my Red Sea Film Foundation family led by the chairwoman of the foundation Jomana Alrashid and its managing director Shivani Pandya Malhotra.”
The fourth edition of Saudi’s Red Sea International Film Festival will run Dec. 5-14 in Jeddah.
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