After the Toronto International Film Festival Grolsch Film Works Discovery Award presentation on Sunday, September 9th, we met up with director Ruba Nadda, who just presented the evenings award to Rola Nashef for Detroit Unleaded. We had a chance to sit down and discuss her latest film Inescapable, which has its worldwide premiere at this year’s festival (September 11th).
The film follows a father’s desperate search for his daughter after she goes missing in Damascus. Having been gone 30 years, he must return to Syria and confront secrets from his past in order to find her.
In theatres September 14th. Watch trailer.
(Interview by Sara Basso of Collective Friction Film Collective and The Grid Does TIFF)
Sara: Congratulations on having the world premiere of Inescapable at TIFF this year! Can you tell us a little bit about it?
Ruba: Thank you! It stars Alexander Siddig, again who starred in my last film Cairo Time, Joshua Jackson, Marisa Tomei, and Oded Fehr. It’s premiering worldwide at Roy Thompson Hall theatre, September 11th at 6:30pm, and I’m so excited but so scared!
Sara: You had your first TIFF premiere back in 2009 with Cairo Time and now you’re back with Inescapable. Can you tell us what the experience has been like the second time around?
Ruba: It doesn’t get any easier. It’s so petrifying. My first time here with Cairo Time I was excited half the time, and scared half the time. It was like a fist around my heart and it hasn’t changed. I fluctuate between feeling so honoured to be here at TIFF, and wanting to dig a whole for myself and jump in – I’m so scared, haha! It’s hard when you love your movie so much; it’s really hard to be like, “OK, I’m letting it go.” I mean, I’ve lived with it for six years now so it’s been a long process.
Sara: It’s amazing to see how so many filmmakers’ careers are launched after having their film premiere at TIFF. You really get to see a filmmaker grow-up, so-to-speak, both professionally and artistically. What would you say TIFF has done for your career as a filmmaker?
Ruba: When TIFF backed Cairo Time, they really championed it. They loved it, they believed in it, and helped not just put me on the map as a filmmaker but their support offered legitimacy to my ‘little baby’ and we ended up selling it to the US. The film then ended up doing really well in the US and made money theatrically, which was great. This film festival really does so much for a filmmaker and their movie by providing them with validation and legitimacy to the world.
Sara: And what does that mean as a Canadian filmmaker?
Ruba: Well this is the number one festival in the world! I was born in Quebec and grew up all across Canada, I’ve lived in Damascus Syria, and I’ve lived in Toronto now for the last 20 years, so Toronto is my home. My family and my friends are all here. I want the worldwide premiere to be in Toronto on every movie I do. It feels like home, coming here and showing my movie for the first time; it’s really wonderful.
Sara: What was the journey you went through with Inescapable? Did your success with Cairo Time help you leverage this project?
Ruba: I was writing three scripts at the same time: Cairo Time, Inescapable, and my next one, and this was over the course of six years. And with the financing, it’s funny; it never gets easier. No matter how much success you have financially at the box office or with critical acclaim, it’s still very, very difficult. So we had a lot of ups and downs. The movie was financed last year and fell apart while we were in the middle of production. If I have to think about everything that I went through to get this movie made, it makes me want to cry because it’s just so fleeting. It’s like a deck of cards, financing a movie, so it’s an honour to be able to sit down and talk about this now that it’s all made, you know? It’s like, phew – it’s in the can, it’s made, and it’s going to have its premiere… thank God!
Sara: What kind of Canadian support did you get while you were making the film?
Ruba: Telefilm has been amazing. They supported me from start to finish. You know the thing that you need is the time to develop a script. A writer can’t go from working a nine-to-five job, and then come home and write at night. They need to write 24 hours a day, and Telefilm provided me with that. My challenge was outside of Telefilm. As a female filmmaker – and I hate talking about it because I can’t do anything about my femaleness – and it being the first time I was going to direct a film that I wrote that wasn’t a romance, but a thriller, it threw a wrench into certain things. So that was one of the hoops; I had to convince a lot of people that I could direct my own movie – as a thriller! There’s a part of me that was like “Yeah, yeah, I get it. You got to jump through hoops.” but I think it’s the process of being a filmmaker that no matter what, or where you come from, if you’re trying to tell a story and it’s your own little baby it’s going to be life and death. It’s going to be really difficult to get it made, financially and emotionally.
Sara: Arguably a film can’t get made without a good producer. Can you tell us about your producing team?
Ruba: After my first feature Sabah, my mentor and technical producer Atom Egoyan put me in touch with Daniel Iron and Christine Vachon. I don’t take “No” for an answer so I called and e-mailed them and basically said, “I love both of you and have so much respect for you, and you need to work with me!” and they took a chance. So we got together and produced Cairo Time and we did it again for Inescapable, and we’re going to do it again for the next one. When you find your partnerships with your producers, you do not let them go because there is a trust there and a short hand. When the film fell apart last year everyone looked at me with pity – they thought I was done – but my producers didn’t walk away from me. That’s what you need in a team.
Sara: You touched on your experience as a female director before. We are starting to see more and more women take the director’s chair than ever before. Is there any advice you can offer to other female directors?
Ruba: I think it’s so wonderful! When I was really trying to become a filmmaker, in such a competitive industry, I swore that if I ever got to a position where I could help, I would. You need to help each other out, I cannot stress that enough. I think the key to filmmaking and getting your movie made is perseverance. You can’t take no for an answer and you cannot give up, it’s that simple. The onus is on you, the filmmaker; you cannot walk away from your baby.
Sara: Do you have any additional advice you could offer to Canadian filmmakers that are looking to make their films here in Canada?
Ruba: Producing in Canada is way better than the US. We have so many government sources in place and we need to take advantage of it! Filmmaking isn’t easy, so the more we can utilize the resources we have available to us, the better. The secret is, always tell a great story that you are passionate about and that you cannot walk away from. All that any audience craves is good old-fashioned storytelling; everything else is gravy. So stick to that personal story and you will survive.
Sara: Ruba, thank you so much for making the time to speak with us. We’re really excited for the premiere of Inescapable and wish you all the best at this year’s festival!
Ruba: Thank you so much! I am so excited!
Collective Friction 