EXCLUSIVE: Jordan has withdrawn Sareen Hairabedian’s documentary My Sweet Land as its official entry for Best International Feature Film at the 97th Academy Awards, reportedly after coming under pressure from Azerbaijan, Deadline has learned.
The award-winning documentary follows 11-year-old Vrej, who dreams of becoming a dentist in his village in Artsakh, an ethnic Armenian enclave within Nagorno-Karabakh, which has been at the heart of a violent dispute between Azerbaijan and Armenia since the 1980s. Artsakh fought for decades to become a breakaway state, an independence movement that ended with the Azerbaijani offense of 2023.
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The choice of the film by Jordan sparked controversy in Azerbaijan where its sympathetic account of the Armenians displaced by the conflict was viewed as taking an overtly anti-Azerbaijani stance.
Deadline understands the Azerbaijan government wrote to Jordan’s Foreign Ministry requesting it reconsider the film’s selection as its Oscar entry, which in turn put pressure on the Jordan’s Royal Film Commission to withdraw the film.
Sources at the Academy of Motion Picture Arts & Sciences confirm Jordan withdrew My Sweet Land for consideration as Best International Feature Film. This leaves Jordan without an entry in that category for the 97th Academy Awards.
Director Sareen Hairabedian and producer Azza Hourani tell Deadline exclusively, “This is very devastating news for our team that an emotional intimate story of a child’s love for his home and family was banned and silenced. As documentary filmmakers, this censorship compels us more than ever to share My Sweet Land protagonist Vrej’s story, which reflects the experiences of countless children around the world today, who deserve to dream freely without the threat of war and conflict.”
After Jordan withdrew the film as a contender for Best International Feature Film, the Academy told filmmakers they could submit My Sweet Land for consideration as Best Documentary Feature, if they followed standard qualification procedures. The filmmaking team has scrambled to arrange a qualifying run in the U.S.
“My Sweet Land will have its North American premiere at DOC NYC on November 16th and 17th, and our qualifying theatrical release will take place at Laemmle Theatres [in Los Angeles] starting November 29th,” Hairabedian and Hourani tell us. “We remain committed to sharing our truthful story, undeterred by the obstacles we face.”
The move to withdraw the film from the International Feature Film category comes amid growing diplomatic and economic ties between Jordan and Azerbaijan, with Azerbaijani Foreign Minister Jeyhun Bayramov receiving Jordanian officials in Baku in 2024 to discuss further ongoing cooperation.
“Our understanding was that Jordan withdrew the film in order to preserve diplomatic ties between Jordan and Azerbaijan after a complaint from the latter,” the filmmakers say. “We also learned that after My Sweet Land’s premiere in Jordan at the Amman International Film Festival, Azerbaijan’s embassy had also filed a complaint against screening the film publicly. So, My Sweet Land, a film that was celebrated weeks prior at the festival, was suddenly banned in one of its home countries.”
Deadline has contacted the Jordanian Film Commission for comment. If we hear back, we will update this piece.
Jordan’s Royal Film Commission is the governing body of the Amman International Film Festival. At that event in July 2024, My Sweet Land won three prizes: Jury Award for Best Arab Documentary, the Audience Award and the International Film Critics Award (FIPRESCI). The documentary premiered in June at Sheffield DocFest, the most prestigious nonfiction festival in the U.K., where it was nominated for the International First Feature Award.
Sheffield DocFest programmers wrote of the film, “Vrej, the subject of Sareen Hairabedian’s impressive feature debut – a striking coming-of-age tale – has grown up in Nagorno-Karabakh, an ethnic Armenian enclave within Azerbaijan. Since the end of the Soviet era it has witnessed much conflict. The 11-year-old watches birds, plays with friends and dreams of being a dentist. But echoes of the three wars his family have lived through since 1992 are ever-present. His grandmother laments the cycle of ethnic violence: ‘Living in Artsakh means that one day there will be a war and my grandson will participate in that war’. As his school lessons become increasingly militarised and Vrej struggles to hold on to his childhood dreams, his grandmother watches her prophecy unfold.”
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