Displacement Film Fund unveils recipient filmmakers and projects for pilot scheme

Five short film production grants bestowed to Maryna Er Gorbach,
Mo Harawe, Hasan Kattan, Mohammad Rasoulof and Shahrbanoo Sadat as panel at Cannes Film Festival announced.

Cate Blanchett, actor, producer and Global Goodwill Ambassador for UNHCR, the UN Refugee Agency, together with IFFR’s Hubert Bals Fund, today announced the five recipients of the Displacement Film Fund, a new short film grant scheme which was established to champion and fund the work of displaced filmmakers, or filmmakers with a proven track record in creating authentic storytelling about the experiences of displaced people.

In this pilot version of the Fund – which is backed by a coalition of leading film industry experts, creators, business leaders and philanthropists – each of the nominated filmmakers will be bestowed with a production grant of €100,000. The completed projects will have their world premieres at IFFR 2026. 

The five recipient filmmakers and their projects are: 

Maryna Er Gorbach 

• Er Gorbach is a Ukrainian filmmaker who writes, directs, produces and edits films. She won the directing award in the World Cinema Dramatic Competition at the 2022 Sundance Film Festival for her film Klondike.
• Project: Silk Road (working title)
  • Silk Road is a timely Ukraine–Europe road movie about a young Ukrainian woman whose family has been torn apart by war: while her children live in Europe, she and her husband remain in Kyiv, working in a children’s hospital as the war goes on.

Mo Harawe 

• Harawe is a Somali-Austrian filmmaker whose debut feature film, The Village Next to Paradise, was selected for the Un Certain Regard section of the 2024 Cannes Film Festival. 
• Project: Whispers of a Burning Scent (working title)
  • On the day of a pivotal court hearing, a quiet man faces the unraveling of his marriage and the judgment of his stepchildren, while searching for solace in what once gave his life meaning.

Hasan Kattan

• Syrian filmmaker Kattan is co-director of Last Men in Aleppo, which was shortlisted for the Academy Awards and secured the prestigious Jury Prize at the Sundance Film Festival. 
• Project: Allies in Exile (working title)
  • Two Syrian filmmakers, bound by a 14-year friendship forged in war, document their shared exile in the UK asylum system – until one is granted refuge and the other returns to a changed Syria, reflecting the impossible choices refugees face today.

Mohammad Rasoulof 

• Rasoulof is an Iranian independent filmmaker who was forced to flee to a safe house in Germany after being sentenced again by the Islamic Republic to eight years in prison, following the selection of his film The Seed of the Sacred Fig in the main competition at the 2024 Cannes Film Festival. The film, the fourth of his features to be selected by Cannes, went on to be nominated for an Academy Award.
• Project: Title TBD
  • After the death of an exiled writer, his family tries to fulfill his wish to be buried according to his will – but honouring his request leads to unexpected complications.

Shahrbanoo Sadat

• Sadat is an Afghan filmmaker, writer and producer based in Kabul who has recently fled to Germany. Her debut film Wolf and Sheep won the top award in the 2016 Directors’ Fortnight section at Cannes. 
• Project: Female Fitness of Kabul (working title)
  • Inside a crumbling Kabul gym, its walls covered with oiled muscle men and doors open to women for only a few hours each day, Afghan housewives in scarves and long dresses reclaim not just their bodies, but also their spirits, their bonds, and their sense of self.

Cate Blanchett said: “Displacement may disrupt careers, but for artists it doesn’t diminish the drive to tell urgent, human stories. In a time of growing division, film offers a powerful counterforce to remind us of our shared humanity. I can’t wait to see what these exceptional filmmakers bring to life – whether addressing displacement directly, or exploring the universal threads that unite us.”

Clare Stewart, Managing Director IFFR, and Tamara Tatishvili, Head of the Hubert Bals Fund, said: “The Displacement Film Fund responds to the urgency of a growing global crisis, and is underpinned by a belief that film continues to be a force for positive change. In its pilot edition, the fund focuses on enabling five filmmakers, each with a proven track-record for visionary cinema, and each navigating their own personal experience of displacement. The HBF is committed to supporting funding that creates an impact, and the Displacement Film Fund aligns perfectly with the HBF’s mission and legacy. We are honoured to be entrusted with the management of this fund, and to work with these exceptional filmmakers to support the realisation of their projects.” 

Thierry Frémaux, General Delegate at Cannes Film Festival, added: “The Cannes Film Festival is proud and honoured to host the Displacement Film Fund panel, giving voice to artists whose journeys have been marked by exile and displacement. By embracing their perspectives, the Festival reaffirms — more than ever — its role as a refuge: a home for those who see cinema as a free and universal act, one that transmits, resists, and bears witness to the world around us.”

Displacement Film Fund panel, 14.30 Friday 23 May

A panel event on the Displacement Film Fund will be held as part of the Cannes Film Festival’s official programme taking place at 14.30 on Friday 23 May at the Palais des Festivals’ Press Conference room. The panel will feature Cate Blanchett alongside grant recipients Maryna Er Gorbach and Mo Harawe, and Rajendra Roy, Chief Curator of Film at the The Museum of Modern Art (NY). 

The discussion will be hosted by IFFR’s Managing Director, Clare Stewart and address the evolution and purpose of the fund, the recipient filmmakers and their projects, and wider industry actions in support of displaced filmmakers. Rajendra Roy is also Co-Chair of the International Film Award Executive Committee, Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences which recently announced  that Academy Award® eligibility for the Best International Feature Film Award has been expanded to include filmmakers with refugee or asylum status. 

Selection process

For the Displacement Film Fund’s selection process, a longlist of filmmakers was determined by the Nominations Committee, which included founding members Cate Blanchett, Isaac Kwaku Fokuo, Echo Quan, Ke Huy Quan, Ayman Tamer, and Koji Yanai, together with Droom en Daad’s Wim Pijbes, IFFR’s Clare Stewart and HBF’s Tamara Tatishvili.

The Selection Committee, who then determined the final recipients, was chaired by Cate Blanchett and included journalist and documentarian Waad Al Kateab (We Dare to Dream, For Sama), actor, producer and musician Cynthia Erivo (Wicked, Drift), director and screenwriter Agnieszka Holland (Green Border), IFFR Festival Director Vanja Kaludjercic, educator, activist and refugee Aisha Khurram, filmmaker Jonas Poher Rasmussen (Flee), and Amin Nawabi [alias], an LGBTQ+ asylum seeker who is Jonas’ inspiration for the story of Flee. 

About the Displacement Film Fund

The Founding Partners of the Displacement Film Fund’s pilot scheme are Master Mind, Uniqlo, Droom en Daad, the Tamer Family Foundation and Amahoro Coalition whose generous contributions enabled the scheme. The HBF is the Management Partner and UNHCR, the UN Refugee Agency, is supporting the project as Strategic Partner. 

With one in every 67 people on earth forcibly displaced due to conflict, war, or persecution, the global community is witnessing an unprecedented crisis. The Displacement Film Fund was first initiated at UNHCR’s Global Refugee Forum, the world’s largest gathering dedicated to addressing challenges faced by refugees and their host communities. Cate Blanchett joined fellow UNHCR supporters Ke Huy Quan, Echo Quan, Ayman Tamer, Koji Yanai, and Isaac Kwaku Fokuo to develop the idea at the event. In order to deepen the insights, expertise and reach of the Fund, Blanchett sought out and recruited a wider group of film industry experts and creatives, all of whom have a personal connection and/or strong interest in the issue of forced displacement – and established the Fund with a mission of giving visibility and bringing to the mainstream stories of displacement, while highlighting the diversity of displacement-related life experiences.