DIRECTOR: Shahad Ameen
STARRING: Lamar Faden, Khairia Nazmi, Naif Aldaferi
RUNNING TIME: 1 hr 55 minutes
LANGUAGE: Arabic, Urdu, Turkish, English
PLOT: Set against the vast Saudi desert, this intimate drama follows three generations of women bound by faith and family. When the eldest granddaughter mysteriously disappears during their pilgrimage to Mecca, her grandmother embarks on a relentless journey north, confronting the weight of tradition, loss, and love.
GENRE: Drama
FILMING LOCATION: Neom, Saudi Arabia
To check out all previous submissions for Saudi Arabia, click HERE.
STARRING: Lamar Faden, Khairia Nazmi, Naif Aldaferi
RUNNING TIME: 1 hr 55 minutes
LANGUAGE: Arabic, Urdu, Turkish, English
PLOT: Set against the vast Saudi desert, this intimate drama follows three generations of women bound by faith and family. When the eldest granddaughter mysteriously disappears during their pilgrimage to Mecca, her grandmother embarks on a relentless journey north, confronting the weight of tradition, loss, and love.
GENRE: Drama
FILMING LOCATION: Neom, Saudi Arabia
To check out all previous submissions for Saudi Arabia, click HERE.
FILM REVIEW:
(This review contains spoilers.)
“Inside our head we have a brain, learn to use it."
Shahad Ameen’s Hijra is a haunting and visually mesmerizing journey through the shifting sands of faith, identity, and belonging. Set against the striking backdrop of the Saudi desert, the film tells the story of three generations of women whose lives intertwine during a journey to Mecca, a pilgrimage that transforms into something far deeper than a religious act. Ameen, who previously impressed audiences with Scales, continues to explore the intersection of myth and reality, but this time grounds her vision in a profoundly emotional human story. Every frame is drenched in light and silence, reflecting both the beauty and isolation of the desert, as well as the unspoken tensions that live within families.
The film’s power lies in its ability to merge the physical and the spiritual. As the eldest granddaughter mysteriously disappears, the grandmother’s journey northward becomes not only a search for the lost teenager but also an internal pilgrimage of memory and reconciliation. Ameen avoids melodrama, choosing instead to let the landscape and gestures speak, a look, a prayer, the sound of the wind replacing dialogue. This restraint creates a meditative rhythm that pulls the viewer into the women’s shared consciousness, where love, duty, and rebellion intertwine. The cinematography, with its near-monochrome palette of sand and sky, feels almost sacred; every image evokes a kind of spiritual ache.
While Hijra unfolds with a quiet tempo, it never loses tension. The emotional stakes are immense, especially as the grandmother’s search begins to blur the lines between faith and fear. Ameen’s storytelling honors the dignity of her characters while challenging cultural expectations surrounding womanhood and generational responsibility. What emerges is not just a portrait of three women but a chronicle of a society in motion, caught between its traditions and the growing desire to redefine them.
At its core, Hijra is a film about transformation, the literal meaning of the word itself. It examines how migration, both physical and emotional, becomes an act of survival and renewal. Through the lens of a grandmother’s devotion and a young woman’s disappearance, Ameen captures the universal struggle to find freedom within faith, and strength within silence. The film’s main point, ultimately, is that journeys of the soul often begin where the road ends, when we are forced to confront loss, love, and the courage it takes to begin again.
(This review contains spoilers.)
“Inside our head we have a brain, learn to use it."
Shahad Ameen’s Hijra is a haunting and visually mesmerizing journey through the shifting sands of faith, identity, and belonging. Set against the striking backdrop of the Saudi desert, the film tells the story of three generations of women whose lives intertwine during a journey to Mecca, a pilgrimage that transforms into something far deeper than a religious act. Ameen, who previously impressed audiences with Scales, continues to explore the intersection of myth and reality, but this time grounds her vision in a profoundly emotional human story. Every frame is drenched in light and silence, reflecting both the beauty and isolation of the desert, as well as the unspoken tensions that live within families.
The film’s power lies in its ability to merge the physical and the spiritual. As the eldest granddaughter mysteriously disappears, the grandmother’s journey northward becomes not only a search for the lost teenager but also an internal pilgrimage of memory and reconciliation. Ameen avoids melodrama, choosing instead to let the landscape and gestures speak, a look, a prayer, the sound of the wind replacing dialogue. This restraint creates a meditative rhythm that pulls the viewer into the women’s shared consciousness, where love, duty, and rebellion intertwine. The cinematography, with its near-monochrome palette of sand and sky, feels almost sacred; every image evokes a kind of spiritual ache.
While Hijra unfolds with a quiet tempo, it never loses tension. The emotional stakes are immense, especially as the grandmother’s search begins to blur the lines between faith and fear. Ameen’s storytelling honors the dignity of her characters while challenging cultural expectations surrounding womanhood and generational responsibility. What emerges is not just a portrait of three women but a chronicle of a society in motion, caught between its traditions and the growing desire to redefine them.
At its core, Hijra is a film about transformation, the literal meaning of the word itself. It examines how migration, both physical and emotional, becomes an act of survival and renewal. Through the lens of a grandmother’s devotion and a young woman’s disappearance, Ameen captures the universal struggle to find freedom within faith, and strength within silence. The film’s main point, ultimately, is that journeys of the soul often begin where the road ends, when we are forced to confront loss, love, and the courage it takes to begin again.
