Guilt
Synopsis:
Guilt is the story of five prominent Afghan women escaping the Taliban, who put their faith in an unlikely group of women devoted to saving their lives, as world superpowers retreat. The film reconstructs the daring extraction, and explores the women at its center using documentary footage capturing the extraction in real time. Modeled as a doc thriller following the perilous journey from Kabul to the border through Taliban strongholds, the narrative will create portraits of the women; their personal histories, their dreams, and shattered hopes. With exclusive access to the women, we piece together a picture of the personal and national tragedy of Afghanistan from a unique female perspective and tell a fascinating and suspenseful tale of women helping women where men and governments had failed.
Producer: Osnat Saraga
Director: Roni Aboulafia
Nation: Israel
Estimated length: 90 minutes
Screenplay: Roni Aboulafia
Production: Ananey Studios
Budget forecast: 400.000 €
Funding confirmed: 125.000 €
Missing resources: 275.000 €
Objective: CO-PRODUCTION, PRE-SALES, ACQUISITION
Shooting start: October, 2024
Planned end of shooting: October, 2025
Director’s notes:
Helping my friend coordinate between women hiding in Kabul and an evacuation bus trying to get into Kabul Airport, upended my life. I could never have imagined that what started as a casual favor to a friend would, two months later, end with 167 Afghans crossing the border to safety.
The protagonists of the film are some of the bravest and most impressive women I have ever met. They feel that the world forgot about them and about their sisters still suffering under a theocratic regime in Afghanistan. My mission is to help them tell their story.
Production notes:
We have 50 hours of exclusive material shot during the evacuation and the following months. We still need to shoot interviews with the protagonists and visual material in Afghanistan. Kann 11, Israel Public Broadcater commissioned the film. We are at advanced stages of discussions with a Canadian co-producer. Our estimated release date is end of 2024. Our goal is to find a European commission and or co-producer.
DIRECTOR BIOGRAPHY
Roni is a documentary filmmaker. Her projects won critical acclaim both in Israel and in international film festivals. In 2017 she won an Israeli Academy Award for Best Documentary Series. Honorable Men, her last film, debuted at DocAviv 2020. She has spent the past year evacuating at-risk Afghans after the US pullout. Her new documentary project focuses on some of the evacuees.
PRODUCTION Ananey Studios | PRODUCER Osnat Saraga | CONTACTS osnat.saraga@paramount.com
Ananey Studios is an award-winning Tel Aviv-based studio that develops and produces inventive content spanning a variety of genres and target demos; high-concept dramas, documentaries, kids’ and teens’ must-watch TV shows, sitcoms, animation, lifestyle programs, and formats. Ananey Studios’ content has reached major international platforms (including Netflix, Nickelodeon, MTV, CBBC, and HBO).
Ananey Studios is a Paramount company.