Even after he’d accepted the offer of heading up the jury, Baz Luhrmann wasn’t sure if he should attend the Red Sea International Film Festival in Saudi Arabia.
Taking place less than two months after Hamas’ deadly attack on Israel and the latter’s ongoing bombardment of Gaza, where the death toll has exceeded 10,000 and a humanitarian crisis is unfolding, he admits he didn’t know whether, given the circumstances, attending a glitzy film festival in the Middle East was the right thing to do.
“I considered it deeply,” he explains. “And what transpired was that some filmmakers who can’t attend because of what’s going on but have films still showing reached out and said ‘Please, at this time, don’t cancel’.”
In a world where “politics and military solutions fail all of us,” Luhrmann says that the “voices of storytellers, no matter who they are, no matter where they come from, need to get out there.”
He adds: “What storytelling does is humanize life. That’s really important and what’s always getting lost is the sheer humanity. All life is precious and I just thought that I couldn’t just run for the hills and not be there to help bring light on these storytellers, all of whom have very different points of view, when now it’s more important than ever.”
The Australian — best known for blockbusters such as Elvis, The Great Gatsby and Moulin Rouge — also put a lot of deep consideration into accepting the role as jury head, to the extent that he insisted on visiting Saudi Arabia first, doing so in a low-key way and without any fanfare.
“I suppose I wanted to authenticate for myself just how authentic Saudi was in terms of its opening up and its intense drive towards joining the world,” he says.
While there, he met with filmmakers, saw new studios being built, was taken around an Andy Warhol exhibition in the desert, and visited AlUla, the ancient region that has become a major film hub and shooting location. What he found was that the focus on developing the local film industry was “not only authentic,” but came with some sizeable “muscle that’s being put into it.” Luhrmann says it’s given him thoughts about filming in Saudi Arabia himself.
But what “truly struck” Luhrmann was the youthfulness of the country’s population, of which 70 percent are under the age of 40. “The thing that is undeniable is that the environment is young and they want a different world.”
When it comes to the Red Sea Film Festival itself, Luhrmann praises what he says is a lack of censorship, highlighting the inclusion of The Blue Caftan, “a gay love story set in Morocco,” in the 2022 lineup. “You’ve gotta be thinking what that’s only doing for openness in that territory.”
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