GU-Q scholar, boundary-breaking filmmaker representing Sudanese women on screen

Doha, Qatar: Georgetown University in Qatar (GU Q) scholar and filmmaker Dr. Suzi Mirgani reached a cultural milestone last weekend when her debut fea...

Doha, Qatar: Georgetown University in Qatar (GU-Q) scholar and filmmaker Dr. Suzi Mirgani reached a cultural milestone last weekend when her debut feature film Cotton Queen was screened during International Critics’ Week of the Venice Film Festival.

The film follows teenage Nafisa, who comes of age in a Sudanese cotton-farming village under the watchful eye of her grandmother, as modern ambitions clash with deep-rooted traditions.

Dr. Mirgani, who creates under the moniker Suzannah Mirghani, is one of only a few Sudanese women to write and direct a feature-length drama about Sudan, and the first to do so for Cinema. “There are only around ten feature length dramas ever shown in theatres by Sudanese filmmakers, none by women,” she noted.

With the war in Sudan ongoing since April 2023, the film is also a production triumph. “I waited for over a year for the war to finish so I could film in Sudan. I wanted to spend the considerable film budget in my country, but eventually chose to film in Egypt, where my Sudanese actors had taken refuge.”

Born to Sudanese and Russian parents, Dr. Mirgani spent her formative years in Sudan before moving with her family to Doha at 16, where she went on to build her career as both a filmmaker and academic. Due to the intersection of her subject matter and life in the Gulf region, the film secured support from every major film grant-maker in the Middle East—including the Doha Film Institute (DFI), Red Sea Film Fund, and the Arab Fund for Art and Culture.