THEEB: Desert Visions Film Week at FOMO Cinema Tbilisi
Tuesday 23. June at 18:30 - 20:10
FOMO Secret Cinema, Tbilisi
June 23-28 FOMO presents Desert Visions, a journey through some of cinema's most unforgettable deserts. From Australian outback nightmares and American road movies to spaghetti westerns, Soviet science fiction, spiritual quests, and stories of people searching for meaning at the edge of civilisation. These are films about vast landscapes, strange encounters, reinvention, survival, and what happens when the familiar world falls away.
THEEB
Naji Abu Nowar | 2014 | Jordan / United Kingdom / United Arab Emirates / Qatar | Arabic with English subtitles | 1h40m
Of all the films I've chosen to screen this week, THEEB might be the one that feels most connected to the desert itself. Set in Ottoman-controlled Arabia during the First World War, it follows a young Bedouin boy who leaves home and finds himself stranded in a landscape where survival depends on instinct, trust, and an understanding of the land that outsiders simply don't possess.
What I love about THEEB is its simplicity. There are no grand speeches. No elaborate mythology. No larger-than-life antiheroes. It tells its story with extraordinary confidence and allows the landscape to do much of the work.
At times the film plays like a coming-of-age story. At others it feels like a western. In many ways it's both. Naji Abu Nowar takes the structure of a classic frontier adventure and relocates it to a part of the world that cinema rarely explores with such authenticity.
I've always admired films that can make enormous landscapes feel intimate. THEEB does this beautifully. Beneath the adventure and suspense is a story about a child learning how the world really works and discovering that survival often demands difficult choices. It's one of the most accomplished debut features of the last twenty years and one of the finest desert films ever made.
Academy Award nomination for Best Foreign Language Film at the 88th Academy Awards (Jordan's first-ever Oscar nomination).
Winner of Best Director at the Venice Film Festival in the Horizons (Orizzonti) section for Naji Abu Nowar.
Winner of the BAFTA Award for Outstanding Debut by a British Writer, Director or Producer.
Winner of the FIPRESCI Prize (International Federation of Film Critics) at Venice.
Winner of numerous audience and jury awards on the international festival circuit.
FOOD AND DRINK POLICY: FOMO Cinema Lounge Bar opens 1 hour before the first screening of the day and closes at 02:00, serving a wide selection of beer, wine, cocktails, and non-alcoholic refreshments including coffee and tea, as well as fresh hot popcorn! Outside food is allowed in the bar but not in the cinema. No alcohol from outside allowed. All guests are invited to arrive early and stay late!
LOCATION: FOMO Secret Cinema, Bazari Orbeliani, Tbilisi. A five minute walk from Liberty Square metro.
HOW TO FIND FOMO: Enter Bazari Orbeliani via Atoneli St above Carrefour and take the stairs on your left to Level 1. Signage on the door. You can also check our Instagram story highlights for a video showing exactly how to find us: https://www.instagram.com/s/aGlnaGxpZ2h0OjE3OTMzMTA2Mjk0MDI5MjM1
FOMO Secret Cinema • Bazari Orbeliani, 0105 Tbilisi, Georgia
