Joyland‘s director, Saim Sadiq, gave his two cents about his film’s official release in Pakistan, which will take place on 18 November.
He and actress Alina Khan, who plays Biba in the controversial (read: ‘queer love’) movie, revealed they are curious to see what kind of reaction or discourse it will spark nationwide.
Speaking to the media, Saim Sadiq remarked,
Any debate or discourse that comes out of it, even if it’s not pleasant, as long as it’s civil and it leads to people talking to each other and sharing their different views, is okay.
He added, “If one person identifies with Haider’s character more, the other will relate to Mumtaz or Biba, that’s what’s interesting about this film”.
“There’s something for everyone to relate with and they’ll have something to talk about after the film instead of ‘bus, maza aya’,” Saim Sadiq concluded.
He laid emphasis on the fact that his film was not intended to offend anyone but for people to empathize with what makes them uncomfortable otherwise.
Trans-actor Alina Khan also shared insight about her character in the film. She revealed that ‘Biba’ isn’t anything like her in real life and explained that her character’s main struggle in the film is “to bring acceptance into the world”.
Joyland has enjoyed great success internationally as it was the first-ever Pakistani competitive entry at the Cannes film festival. The film also won the Jury Prize in the Un Certain Regard competition — a segment that focused on young, innovative cinema talent, and was the winner of this year’s Queer Palme.
Joyland’s cast includes the icons Sania Saeed, Sarwat Gilani, Salman Peerzada, and Rasti Farooq, besides Alina Khan in the leading role.
Joyland is Pakistan’s official submission for the 2023 Academy Awards (The Oscars) and was executively produced by Nobel laureate Malala Yousafzai who joined the crew in September.
