Looking for Oum Kulthum

  • Archive - Festival 33
  • Director: Shirin Neshat
  • Germany, Austria, Italy, Lebanon, Qatar 2017
  • 90 minutes
  • English, Arabic,
  • Subtitles in Hebrew

With intricate storytelling and exquisite imagery, Iranian artist and filmmaker Shirin Neshat captivates with a film-within-a-film about Oum Kulthum, ‘the voice of Egypt’. Neshat sidesteps any attempt at a linear biopic and instead confronts Kulthum's meaning and magnitude through the lens of another artist trying to tell her story.

Mitra, an exiled Iranian director, is striving to make a biopic about the international icon. Her dilemmas mirror those of her subject as she learns about the sacrifices Kulthum has made to succeed in a male dominated world.

Filmography: Women without Men (2009),


  • Director Shirin Neshat
  • Production Roman Paul, Gerhard Meixner, Bruno Wagner, Martin Gschlacht, Antonin Svoboda, Shirin Neshat, Shoja Azari
  • Script Shirin Neshat, Shoja Azari
  • Cinematography Martin Gschlacht
  • Editing Nadia Ben Rachid
  • Music Amine Bouhafa
  • Festivals Venice, Toronto, London
  • Actors Neda Rahmanian, Yasmin Raeis, Mehdi Moinzadeh, Kais Nashif
  • Source The Match Factory, Cologne