After being one of the two first-ever Jordanian films to be selected for the Cannes Film Festival — where it held its world premiere at Cannes’ Quinzaine des Cinéastes Section — Faris Alrjoob’s German-Jordanian short THE RED SEA MAKES ME WANNA CRY took home the El Gouna Film Festival's Silver Star For Short Films at the closing ceremony of its sixth edition, where it held its Arab World premiere.
 
The romantic thriller follows a haunted Ida, who travels to the liminal site of her partner’s disappearance in an attempt to feel his presence one last time and to say goodbye.
Starring burgeoning young Jordanian actor Mohamed Nizar, German actress Clara Schwinning, and Emmy-nominated American-Palestinian-Kuwaiti journalist-actor Ahmed Shihab Eldin, and Anwar Khalil, the short film was produced by top German film school Film-und Medienstiftung NRW.
 
THE RED SEA MAKES ME WANNA CRY is directed, written, and co-produced by Faris Alrjoob; co-written by Matthew LaPaglia; co-produced by Luisa Stricker and Luma Al Hamarneh; lensed by Mahmoud Belakhel; edited by Benedikt Strick; and distributed worldwide by MAD Solutions.
 
Faris Alrjoob is an interdisciplinary artist working within the fields of film, video art, and performance, based in Berlin, he is a graduate student at the Academy of Media Arts in Cologne and previously at Emerson College in Boston.
 
In 2020, he directed his short film THE GHOSTS WE LEFT AT HOME, which world premiered at the International Short Film Festival Oberhausen in Germany and screened at prestigious festivals like the Malmö Arab Film Festival, the Red Sea International Film Festival, and the Internationales Frauenfilmfestival.