EXCLUSIVE: Jordan has withdrawn Sareen Hairabedian’s documentary My Candy Land as its official entry for Finest Worldwide Characteristic Movie on the 97th Academy Awards, reportedly after coming underneath stress from Azerbaijan, Deadline has discovered.
The award-winning documentary follows 11-year-old Vrej, who desires of changing into a dentist in his village in Artsakh, an ethnic Armenian enclave inside Nagorno-Karabakh, which has been on the coronary heart of a violent dispute between Azerbaijan and Armenia because the Nineteen Eighties. Artsakh fought for many years to grow to be a breakaway state, an independence motion that ended with the Azerbaijani offense of 2023.
The selection of the movie by Jordan sparked controversy in Azerbaijan the place its sympathetic account of the Armenians displaced by the battle was considered as taking an overtly anti-Azerbaijani stance.
Deadline understands the Azerbaijan authorities wrote to Jordan’s International Ministry requesting it rethink the movie’s choice as its Oscar entry, which in flip put stress on the Jordan’s Royal Movie Fee to withdraw the movie.
Sources on the Academy of Movement Image Arts & Sciences affirm Jordan withdrew My Candy Land for consideration as Finest Worldwide Characteristic Movie. This leaves Jordan with out an entry in that class for the 97th Academy Awards.
Director Sareen Hairabedian and producer Azza Hourani inform Deadline completely, “That is very devastating information for our group that an emotional intimate story of a kid’s love for his dwelling and household was banned and silenced. As documentary filmmakers, this censorship compels us greater than ever to share My Candy Land protagonist Vrej’s story, which displays the experiences of numerous youngsters world wide at present, who need to dream freely with out the specter of struggle and battle.”
After Jordan withdrew the movie as a contender for Finest Worldwide Characteristic Movie, the Academy informed filmmakers they may submit My Candy Land for consideration as Finest Documentary Characteristic, in the event that they adopted customary qualification procedures. The filmmaking group has scrambled to rearrange a qualifying run within the U.S.
‘My Candy Land’
HAI Inventive LLC/Sister Productions/Soilsíu Movies
“My Candy Land may have its North American premiere at DOC NYC on November sixteenth and seventeenth, and our qualifying theatrical launch will happen at Laemmle Theatres [in Los Angeles] beginning November 29th,” Hairabedian and Hourani inform us. “We stay dedicated to sharing our truthful story, undeterred by the obstacles we face.”
The transfer to withdraw the movie from the Worldwide Characteristic Movie class comes amid rising diplomatic and financial ties between Jordan and Azerbaijan, with Azerbaijani International Minister Jeyhun Bayramov receiving Jordanian officers in Baku in 2024 to debate additional ongoing cooperation.
“Our understanding was that Jordan withdrew the movie as a way to protect diplomatic ties between Jordan and Azerbaijan after a criticism from the latter,” the filmmakers say. “We additionally discovered that after My Candy Land’s premiere in Jordan on the Amman Worldwide Movie Competition, Azerbaijan’s embassy had additionally filed a criticism in opposition to screening the movie publicly. So, My Candy Land, a movie that was celebrated weeks prior on the pageant, was all of the sudden banned in certainly one of its dwelling international locations.”
Deadline has contacted the Jordanian Movie Fee for remark. If we hear again, we’ll replace this piece.
Jordan’s Royal Movie Fee is the governing physique of the Amman Worldwide Movie Competition. At that occasion in July 2024, My Candy Land gained three prizes: Jury Award for Finest Arab Documentary, the Viewers Award and the Worldwide Movie Critics Award (FIPRESCI). The documentary premiered in June at Sheffield DocFest, essentially the most prestigious nonfiction pageant within the U.Okay., the place it was nominated for the Worldwide First Characteristic Award.
‘My Candy Land’
HAI Inventive LLC/Sister Productions/Soilsíu Movies
Sheffield DocFest programmers wrote of the movie, “Vrej, the topic of Sareen Hairabedian’s spectacular function debut – a putting coming-of-age story – has grown up in Nagorno-Karabakh, an ethnic Armenian enclave inside Azerbaijan. Because the finish of the Soviet period it has witnessed a lot battle. The 11-year-old watches birds, performs with buddies and desires of being a dentist. However echoes of the three wars his household have lived by means of since 1992 are ever-present. His grandmother laments the cycle of ethnic violence: ‘Dwelling in Artsakh signifies that someday there shall be a struggle and my grandson will take part in that struggle’. As his college classes grow to be more and more militarised and Vrej struggles to carry on to his childhood desires, his grandmother watches her prophecy unfold.”
