The film was submitted as Sudan’s official nomination for the Best International Feature Film category at the upcoming 2021 Academy Awards.
Sudanese filmmaker Amjad Abu Alala’s You Will Die At Twenty has become the first-ever Sudanese film to be selected for the country’s Oscar’s submission. The film was submitted as Sudan’s official nomination for the Best International Feature Film category at the upcoming 2021 Academy Awards.
The film’s official Twitter handle said: “We’re so proud to announce that Sudan has entered the Academy Awards race for the first time with the selection of Amjad Abu Alala’s You Will Die at Twenty as the country’s first Best International Feature Film submission for the 2021 Academy Awards.”
You Will Die at Twenty is only the eighth feature film ever produced in Sudan. The film is set in Al Jazirah state, where a mother gives birth to Muzamel in a Sudanese village dominated by Sufi beliefs. When a prophecy by the holy man of the village predicts that he will die at the age of 20, Muzamel grows up surrounded by sympathy, making him feel dead before his time, until Suliman, a cinematographer who has worked in the city, returns to the village. Suliman’s old cinema projector opens a window onto a whole new world for Muzamel. Slowly, he comes to doubt the truth of the prophecy.
Abu Alala has made numerous short films that have been shown at film festivals, including Tina (2009), Coffee and Orange (2004), and Feathers of the Birds (2005).
The 93rd Academy Awards ceremony, presented by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, is scheduled to take place at the Dolby Theatre in Hollywood, Los Angeles, California on April 25, 2021.
