Movies & TV Shows from Yemen

When Isra’a discovers she is expecting another baby amid the civil war in Yemen, she and her husband decide she should have an abortion. But this creates enormous difficulties – in their relationship and elsewhere. A moving story from an all-too-often forgotten crisis region.

The Arab Spring, Yemen 2011. The revolution continues. It's the monsoon season and life goes on smoothly for the inhabitants of Socotra Island. Not far from land, a sailing boat bearing an Israeli flag sinks and the search for survivors begins. A castaway is washed ashore a secluded beach. On the other side of the island, a native dreams of the castaway seeking his help.This adventure begins through the castaway's body, a man who in the sinking of his life sees for the first time a chance to know gratefulness, to be reborn. Will he overthrow destiny? Will he get back alive?

Ten-year-old Nojoom was forced to marry a 30-year-old man. The dowry offered the family a small income and 'one less mouth to feed'. Nojoom discovers that her life will take a turn for the worse. Her husband is indifferent to her age. Every day after she is wedded, the child works under harsh conditions and every night, the child-bride is raped by a man 20 years older than her. A legitimate and acceptable arrangement for all, except for Nojoom.

As Layal runs a women-only fuel station in a segregated war-torn town, she is faced with her 12-year-old brother’s growing desire to break free and become a ‘man’. When Layal’s estranged sister unexpectedly shows up with a proposition for their brother, the siblings’ relationship is put to the test.

Recording a 24-hour period throughout every country in the world, we explore a greater diversity of perspectives than ever seen before on screen. We follow characters and events that evolve throughout the day, interspersed with expansive global montages that explore the progression of life from birth, to death, to birth again. In the end, despite unprecedented challenges and tragedies throughout the world, we are reminded that every day we are alive there is hope and a choice to see a better future together. Founded in 2008, it set out to explore our planet's identity and challenges in an attempt to answer the question: Who are we?

A number of obstacles stands in the way of a young couple as only 10 days are left for their wedding, each obstacle is in one way or another caused by the aftermath of the 2015 war in Yemen.

A documentary short that follows a 13-year-old girl named Nejmia, who lives in Sana’a and refuses to wear the veil.

In Yemen, four brothers come of age under the shadow of war. Adham returns from the frontlines haunted by trauma, while Nasser fights to keep his two younger siblings from being recruited. The film is a lyrical meditation on boyhood, memory, and the quiet defiance of hope amid ruins.

In the 1980s, Jamme'a emigrated from Somalia to the city of Aden. Since then, he has been trying every day to develop his love and belonging to this land. Will he find the alternative life he has been looking for?

A portrait of a young girl married at eleven and accused of murdering her husband at fourteen.

The short experimental film 1941 (2021) directed and produced by Asim Abdulaziz, explores the sense of disorientation and alienation experienced by Yemenis. After learning that knitting was a significant way for women in the United States to participate in the war effort during World War II. The repetitive nature of the hand movement guiding the needles and stitching the wool thread distracts one from pondering the past and future, locking the knitter into a timeless present. By staging the practice in Yemen, Abdulaziz draws an embodied metaphor around the quotidian experience of war—captive to the logic of survival—that inhibits projecting oneself into a future of self-realization.

Fariha – a 70-year-old woman from Yemen – stepped out of the limelight of a burgeoning singing career in the 80s after a series of set-backs within a male-dominated society and industry. When filmmaker Badr stumbles upon her singing in her kiosk in downtown Sana’a, he insists on following her with his camera to learn about her past and ultimately tries to convince her to return to her long-lost passion: performing on stage!

The Path to the Tombs visually represents an original poem by Maysoon Al-Eryani. It tells the tragic tale of Lera, a Yemeni woman who loses her husband and searches for him until she is blind.

Set in the historical Old City, in Ibb, Yemen, In the Long Run is built around a simple premise: burdened by the nearing arrival of guests, a housewife sends her kid to buy bread before lunch. But this errand soon transforms into a wondrous adventure. As Seven-year-old Ahmed runs determinedly through the alleyways—constantly distracted by the people and events (or perhaps non-events) around him—his journey becomes both a delicate observation of the familial community of Ibb, and an intimate voyage through the Old City’s endangered architecture and beautiful landscape. While Ahmed plays beads with other kids, stumbles into a funeral, and listens to folktales narrated by an 82-year-old, the looming question of whether he’ll make it home before lunch grows larger. Performed by city locals, In the Long Run presents gentle conversations about fear, fate, and faith. Yet, most importantly, it is a story of a child’s imagination, curiosity and wonder.

Two Yemeni jihadis are sent home by an Al Qaeda mastermind to recruit new members and carry out deadly operations in Yemen.

A short film produced for the European Commission's "Feeding Hope" campaign to raise awareness of the EU's crucial role in funding humanitarian aid operations.

A short documentary film on coexistence and love inside a home in Sana’a.

The story of a young, deaf, Arab girl, born in the ravages of a war zone, whose only weapons are her hearing aids and an old video camera.

BBC Arabic's Nawal Al-Maghafi reveals how the UAE hired mercenaries to conduct targeted assassinations of its political enemies in Yemen, with American mercenaries starting the killings in 2015.

"Sadd Al-Gareeb" translated into English as "The Stranger's Dam" is a dramatic series that is centered on a disagreement between two Yemeni villages which share a water dam. It highlights the negative impact the disagreement has on the lives of the community and their access to water.