What Walaa Wants

What Walaa Wants

TFI Suppport

Gucci Tribeca Documentary Fund 2016 AOL Charitable Foundation Award

Logline

Raised in a refugee camp in the West Bank while her mother was in prison, Walaa is determined to become one of the few women on the Palestinian Security Forces - a big challenge for a girl who breaks all the rules. 

What Walaa Wants

Christy Garland

DIRECTOR

Christy Garland is based in Toronto, but has been working a lot in the Nordic countries. Her award-winning feature documentary THE BASTARD SINGS THE SWEETEST SONG was a Canadian/Danish co-production and premiered at Hot Docs and Sheffield DocFest in 2012. The theatrical premiere in Toronto garnered rave reviews: the Globe and Mail called it "unclassifiable, a love story between a filmmaker and her subjects, echoing the work of Bresson and the Dardennes"; Film Threat - "the most poignant true story ever told", National Post - "heart shattering" and Now Magazine called it "cinematic gold." Her latest film CHEER UP, a Finnish/Canadian co-production, premiered at HotDocs 2016 to great reviews and sold out screenings.

What Walaa Wants

Anne Köhncke

PRODUCER

Co-founder of Final Cut from Real in 2009 together with Signe Byrge Sørensen. Prior to that she was Commissioning Editor of documentaries at DR2 and Sales Executive at TV2 World. Final Cut for Real is an award winning production-house dedicated to high-end creative documentaries for the international market. FCfR today consists of two more producers, Monica Hellström and Heidi Elise Christensen, and Post Producer Maria Kristensen. Selected recent titles from FCfR: THE LOOK OF SILENCE (2014) and THE ACT OF KILLING (2012) by Joshua Oppenheimer, LES SAUTEURS/ THOSE WHO JUMP (2016) by Estephan Wagner, Moritz & Abou Bakar Sidibé, PERVERT PARK (2014) by Frida & Lasse Barkfors, LIFE IS SACRED (2014) by Andreas Dalsgaard

What Walaa Wants

Ekram Zubaydi

PRODUCTION COORDINATOR

Ekram Zubaydi has from the very beginning been a vital part of WHAT WALAA WANTS, supporting several aspects of filming. She is from Tulkarm, West-Bank, where she works as a Project Coordinator for the Palestinian Center for Peace and Democracy, an NGO supported by UNWomen, the Swedish organization Kvinna til Kvinna (Woman to Woman) and Dutch Cordaid. Ekram is also a social and feminist activist on her spare time. She speaks Arabic, English and French and has studied French Literature. 

What Walaa Wants

Matt Code

CO-PRODUCER, MURMUR MEDIA

Matt Code is a film, television and digital media producer who recently completed a residency at the Canadian Film Centre (CFC) in the Film Program Producers’ Lab. Code has worked in many production roles, including as a producer on award-winning television programs and short films.