Karama Has No Walls

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Synopsis:
A visceral tour-de-force, “Karama Has no Walls” depicts the peaceful protest in Sana’a, Yemen’s Change Square, that came to a violent end when sniper fire erupted, leaving many injured and dead. The film deftly merges footage captured by citizen journalists from the day that would come to be known as Friday of Dignity (Jum’at al-Karama) with filmed interviews of the families who suffered and lost on that historic day.

2012
26 minutes
Documentary short
Directed by: Sara Ishaq
Language: Arabic
Country: Yemen/UAE/UK
Website | Trailer

“The most ambitious selection of [the Academy Award for Live Action Short Film competition], Sara Ishaq’s Karama Has no Walls, is set in Change Square in Yemen’s capital, Sana, where a peaceful demonstration demanding the fall of the country’s autocratic ruler, Ali Abdullah Saleh, turned into a bloodbath in which government snipers killed 53 protesters. The film has a similar you-are-there immediacy to The Square, Jehane Noujaim’s transfixing documentary of the tumultuous protests in the center of Cairo.” (link)

Festivals and Awards:
-The Academy Awards: Oscar Nominee for Best Short Documentary
-One World Media Awards (UK): Best Short Documentary nominee,
-BAFTA Scotland New Talent Awards: Best Documentary nominee,
-Al-Jazeera Documentary Film Festival: Best Short Documentary Winner
-UNAFF United Nations Association Film Festival: Best Short Documentary Winner

Filmmaker bio (from film’s website):
Sara Ishaq grew up in Sana’a and moved to Edinburgh to pursue an MFA. Her 2011 return to Yemen to shoot a documentary coincided with the onset of the Yemeni uprising, and she began reporting on the BBC and co-founded the media activist collaborative #SupportYemen. Her films are “Karama Has no Walls” and the feature The Mulberry House. Based between Egypt and Yemen, she is developing a Yemeni production house and film academy for aspiring Yemeni filmmakers.