Kurdistan, a small semi-autonomous region in northern Iraq that has been surrounded by war throughout history, was in the Cannes spotlight on Wednesday, presenting its newly launched film commission under the Deputy Prime Minister’s office and plans for a film fund.
Located in the city of Slemani, a cultural hotspot also called “Suli,” its goal is to bring creatives to Kurdistan as a filming destination, “empower Kurdish creatives through training and support” and “open the region’s stories and locations to filmmakers worldwide.”
H.E. Qubad Talabani, Deputy Prime Minister and president of the Kurdistan Film Commission Slemani, traveled to the Croisette to invite the world to the region and discuss the vision during a Cannes market session that also featured Bavi Yassin, founder and chair of the film commission, Kurdish-Swedish actor Kardo Razzazi (Rheingold, Peacemaker), Amanda Toney, managing director of online platform for creatives Stage 32, and Marj Galas, senior director, members & education at the Association of Film Commissioners International (AFCI).
When hearing the word Kurdistan, “a lot of people will think about war or think about devastation, migration and refugees,” Talabani told the Cannes audience. “But I’m here to tell you that there’s another side to Kurdistan, an exciting side. There is an opportunity now, with the launch of the Kurdistan Film Commission, to show this other side. One is its natural beauty. Two, we are a very artistic culture. It’s about telling our story. Art has always been the medium for us to tell our story.”
Qubad Talabani, Deputy Prime Minister and president of the Kurdistan Film Commission Slemani, and Bavi Yassin, founder and chair of the film commission at the Cannes market
Courtesy of Kurdistan Film Commission
He also highlighted the economic benefits of encouraging production. “It’s an opportunity for us to diversify what Kurdistan is. It’s not just about politics, it’s not just about oil,” Talabani explained. “We are very excited to announce that Kurdistan is open for development, and our beautiful locations are open for you all to see. We look forward to hosting you all in Kurdistan.”
Yassin, who grew up in Belgium and has a BA and MA in filmmaking from Brussels, first returned to Kurdistan to make a documentary. “When I saw the country and its great potential to develop into a real audio-visual industry, I began to dig in, research, and pitch the project,” she tells THR. “It took me 10 years of lobbying and work to get here, and I’m grateful.”
During the panel session, she recalled that when she started sharing her vision for Kurdistan as a filming hub in 2014, “we were dealing with ISIS a few kilometers away from us, and we were dealing with a lot of political matters and issues.” But she stayed the course due to her conviction in the opportunity, highlighting: “We have everything needed to build a very solid film industry.”
She used the panel to share news of the planned Suli Film Fund, with details of its size and criteria to be disclosed in the near future.
The Kurdistan Film Commission Slemani steps onto the global stage with an event and panel discussion at the Cannes 2025 market
Courtesy of Kurdistan Film Commission
As such screen hits as Game of Thrones and The White Lotus have shown, film- and TV-driven tourism is also an opportunity for emerging production hubs. “I also want to emphasize that film tourism is a way to dispel some of those negative connotations that were emphasized at the beginning,” Galas shared with the panel. “When people become fans of content, regardless of what that content is, they get eager to visit the location of the content, and they get exposed to the culture and the richness of the region, so I just wanted to highlight how valuable that is.”
Toney shared how her company, Stage 32, could collaborate with the new film commission. “We have evolved into certified education, so we’ve now been certifying both film and television creatives,” she explained. “We’re now working with over 50 film commissions around the world. So we’re looking to hopefully work with Kurdistan to help certify talent, to support productions that come together.”
Meanwhile, Razzazi, whose work is featured on the likes of Netflix, told the audience how emotional the launch of the film commission left him, saying this about the opportunity that it opens up: “This is a special moment for me,” he shared. “It will allow Kurdish stories, which have been underrepresented on the global stage, to be told.”
Qubad Talabani, Deputy Prime Minister and president of the Kurdistan Film Commission Slemani, and Bavi Yassin, founder and chair of the film commission, at a Cannes market panel
Courtesy of Kurdistan Film Commission
Talabani wrapped up Kurdistan’s debut on the global Cannes stage with an anecdote illustrating the opportunity for film as a showcase of Kurdish soft power and the delight he felt after arriving at the Cannes market. “When I saw the film commission booth, I couldn’t have been more proud,” he told the audience on the Croisette. “I remember when I first started working in politics, and we were meeting at the UN, and they didn’t really let us into the building. We had to meet outside. Eventually, they took us on a tour, and I saw all these flags, hundreds of flags of hundreds of countries. I was looking for my flag, and it wasn’t there.”
But Talabani formulated a happy ending: “So if we can get that flag represented in other ways, non-political ways, non-threatening ways, through art, I can retire and sit back and watch good films made in Kurdistan.”
