The International Film Festival of Assouan’s Woman Film has been organizing cinematographic activities for children for four years. These workshops allow little ones to discover the world of cinema, to learn about the realization and to develop their creativity. Activities include a training workshop to learn how to make animated films and a debate workshop around projected films.
A group of children is selected each year and begins to work about ten days before the start of the festival. They learn to tell a little story, write a script, cut, shoot the film and use software specially created for them. The films made can be traditional animated films or animated films according to the technique of stop-motion. To this end, children have a basket of characters they learn to place on a plain green background, to take a picture, to create the sets, to do the editing, etc. In short, children learn to make their own films.
In addition, there is a screening of a children’s film every day, followed by a debate animated by actor Ashraf Mahdy. Children are encouraged to give their opinion, offer ideas and express themselves. Very pedagogue, Ashraf Mahdy knows how to capture their attention by asking questions about the film to arouse their reflection before explaining to them in a simple way the different aspects of cinema, production techniques and messages conveyed by films.
The children’s cinema workshops are an important initiative for education and the openness of the youngest. They allow children to discover an art that can be a source of pleasure, reflection and creativity. He encourages them to develop their critical thinking and curiosity, and to open up to new forms of artistic expression. Who knows, these workshops could even change their lives and discover vocations!
In addition, these workshops also have an important social role. They allow children of different social backgrounds to meet and discuss subjects that interest them. It gives them the opportunity to discover different realities and cultures, to open up to others and to develop their tolerance and their respect.
When this activity started four years ago, only about ten children had voluntarily participated in this workshop, but since then, partnerships have been concluded with several primary schools in the city to allow a greater number of children to benefit from it. Each day, five students from each class of a determined level of five different schools have the possibility of participating in these projections-debates.
During this 7th Edition of the Festival, which was held from March 5 to 10, 2023, Tunisian director Salma Baccar and I, had the opportunity to attend an animated film screening, followed by a debate with students of 5th year (therefore about 9/10). Mr. Mohamed Abdelkhalek, president of the festival, had presented Salma Baccar by telling them that she was a great director, that she had even been a pioneer in Tunisia and that she attended this 7th edition of the festival as a honored and president of a jury. This had aroused the admiration of children, and probably inspired them to continue their dreams of becoming artists and directors.
Besides, when Ashraf had asked the children to which filmmaker they would later like to look like, they had shouted in unison: “Salma Baccar! ».
In conclusion, the children’s film workshops organized as part of the International Film Festival of Assouan’s Woman Film are an important and laudable initiative for education, open -mindedness and social development of the youngest. Thanks to these workshops, children have the opportunity to discover a fascinating art, to develop their creativity, their critical mind and their curiosity, while learning to open up to others and to discover different cultures. These workshops could even change their lives and make them discover unsuspected artistic vocations. In short, this initiative is an example inspiring with the way cinema can be used to improve people’s lives and contribute to a better world.
Neïla Driss
