السينما المحلية بحاجة إلى قارئ للسرد

Humanities are multifaceted and deeply impactful, and what results from these sciences has the same characteristic.

All arts have the capacity to absorb opinions, whether in acceptance or objection, and among these arts is the art of cinema, which has its diverse purposes and varied goals.

As the world is filled with this art, everyone engaged in it is searching for the different and non-dominant. Thus, ideas are the target, and the rarer the idea, the more it achieves precedence, advancement, and popularity. Any adaptation of an idea results in a film that is often considered inferior; because the original idea has a cultural depth specific to the place from which it originated. The writer of the story or screenplay carries cultural connotations unique to their environment and its people. Any adaptation of a film idea creates a stark contrast between the environment of the idea and the environment of the adapted film due to the cultural, historical, social differences, and psychological characteristics of the people from both environments.

The flaws of adaptation become evident, especially to those who have seen the original, leading to comparisons. Often, the adaptation is undervalued and regarded as a poor copy, causing those involved in the adapted film to lose trust and respect, especially if the director intervenes with additions or omissions.

So, what is the reason for adapting a film that succeeded in its original version? Is the motivation to gain the audience of the original? Perhaps, but behind the adapted film lies accusations of deceit and misrepresentation for those who have not seen the original and later discovered the deception they were subjected to.

The real question is: Why do producers resort to financing an adapted film?

There are several answers here, and regardless of the starting points for these answers, any response will reveal a main problem: that the producer, director, or screenwriter may be lacking in reading skills, or they may be dismissive of what is produced in terms of storytelling within their own countries, or they may be hasty in completing their films regardless of the means. What matters to them is production, sales, and making money from films that achieve profitability, regardless of their quality.

It is a fact that every country in the world has its own narrative producer. If attention were given to that producer, local cinema could achieve successes through the writers of the country. If I wanted to talk about Saudi cinema, I would almost assert that there are creative ideas present in the narratives of our local writers, and they only need to be excavated from our narrative reservoir. Even if there is laziness in the reading aspect on the part of the producer or director, it is not a flaw to create a position affiliated with the film authority or the producing film companies, so that this employee serves as a cultural reference specialized in narrative aspects, providing both parties with ideas extracted from what local stories and novels carry in terms of creative ideas.