‘The Present’ Film Depicting Palestinian Struggle Wins BAFTA Award

Palestinian-British filmmaker Farah Nabulsi’s short film “The Present”, which depicts Palestinian struggle, has won the award for Best Short Film at the 2021 British Academy of Film and Television Arts (BAFTA) ceremony on Saturday.

Co-written by Nabulsi and Hind Shoufani, the film tells the story about a father and daughter in the Israeli-occupied West Bank trying to buy a wedding anniversary gift for the girl’s mother, which turns into an impossible task due to the various checkpoints they must go through across Palestine’s West Bank.

“For anyone who has seen this film… You would know why I dedicate this award to the people of Palestine,” Farah Nabulsi said in her speech.

“For anyone who has seen this film… You would know why I dedicate this award to the people of Palestine.” @farah_nabulsi picks up the British Short Film BAFTA for The Present. @NetflixUK #EEBAFTAs pic.twitter.com/wSptGdDBD8

— BAFTA (@BAFTA) April 10, 2021

The film was released on Netflix on 18 March 2021, and has been previously nominated for the Academy Award for Best Live Action Short Film.

After starting to work in the film industry in 2015, Nabulsi produced four short films on Palestine “to give voice to the silenced and build empathy,” she says in her own words. In the ‘Nightmare of Gaza’, Nabulsi tells the narrative of a woman in the streets of Gaza suffering the consequences and the devastation after the bombs were dropped.

“It’s just the appreciation of what this can do — allowing me to continue my work and continue to tell stories to raise the global social conscience,” Nabulsi tells Esquire Middle East.