- Flash flooding kills three in northern Thailand
- Kaur leads India to victory over Pakistan in Women's T20 World Cup
- Juventus held by Cagliari after late penalty drama
- In France's Marseille, teen 'stabbed 50 times' then burned alive
- Ruthless Gauff beats Muchova in straight sets to win China Open
- India restrict Pakistan to 105-8 in Women's T20 World Cup
- England target repeat of Pakistan Test whitewash
- Penrith Panthers win fourth straight NRL title after downing Storm
- Weary Sinner happy for day off after battling into Shanghai last 16
- Pakistan's Masood warns England still a force without Stokes
- Madrid's Carvajal to miss several months after serious knee injury
- Two elephants die in flash flooding in northern Thailand
- Sabalenka targets world number one and Wuhan hat-trick
- Tunisia votes with Saied set for re-election
- Bagnaia sets 'example' with Japan MotoGP win to cut gap on Martin
- Intense Israeli bombing rocks Beirut ahead of war anniversary
- Mozambique vote: no suspense but some disillusion
- Austrian rapper channels anti-racist rage in Romani hip-hop songs
- Ohtani magic powers Dodgers over Padres in MLB playoff thriller
- Five of the best: Pakistan-England Test thrillers
- Man sets arm on fire as marches across US mark Gaza war anniversary
- Vietnam's young coffee entrepreneurs brew up a revolution
- Trump rallies at site of failed assassination: 'Never quit'
- Too hot by day, Dubai's floodlit beaches are packed at night
- Is music finally reckoning with #MeToo?
- Fans hail Trump's 'guts' as he returns to site of rally shooting
- Lebanon state media says Israeli strikes hit south Beirut
- Miami on track for MLS record points after win in Toronto
- Monaco take top spot in Ligue 1 with win at Rennes
- Madrid beat Villarreal to level Liga leaders Barca
- Thuram treble fires Inter past Torino and up to second
- 'Fight': defiant Trump jets in to site of rally shooting
- Mexico City's new mayor sworn in with pledges on water, housing
- Israel on alert ahead of Hamas attack anniversary
- Guardians maul Tigers in MLB playoff series opener
- Macron criticises Israel on Gaza, Lebanon operations
- French rugby player whistled but 'serene' on return amid ongoing rape case
- Retegui hat-trick fires five-star Atalanta to hammering of Genoa
- Heavyweights Australia, England off to World Cup winning starts
- Visiting UN refugee agency chief decries 'terrible crisis' in Lebanon
- Spinners come to party as England defeat Bangladesh at T20 World Cup
- Search continues for missing in deadly Bosnia floods
- Man City sink Fulham to get title bid back on track
- France's Auradou whistled on Pau return in Perpignan loss amid ongoing rape case
- A 'forgotten' valley in storm-hit North Carolina, desperate for help
- Arsenal hit back in style after Southampton scare
- Hezbollah heir apparent Safieddine out of contact after strikes
- Liverpool stay top of Premier League as Arsenal, Man City win
- In dank Tour of Emilia, Pogacar shines in rainbow jersey
- DR Congo launches mpox vaccination drive, hoping to curb outbreak
Trans-themed film dazzles Cannes in Pakistan debut
The first-ever Pakistani entry in a Cannes Film Festival competition has left audiences slack-jawed and admiring of its daring portrait of a transgender dancer in the Muslim country.
"Joyland" by director Saim Sadiq, a tale of sexual revolution, tells the story of the youngest son in a patriarchal family who is expected to produce a baby boy with his wife but joins an erotic dance theatre and falls for the troupe's director, a trans woman.
The Cannes opening night's audience gave "Joyland" a standing ovation, Variety lauding the movie as "so fresh, we're continuously surprised", while Deadline called it "thoughtful, well performed and engrossing".
Part of the surprise stemmed from the discovery by many at Cannes that Pakistan became one the first nations to give legal protection against discrimination to transgender people.
In 2009, Pakistan legally recognised a third sex, and in 2018, the first transgender passport was issued.
"Pakistan is very schizophrenic, almost bipolar," director Saim Sadiq told AFP in an interview.
"You get, of course, prejudice and some violence against a particular community on the one hand, but you also get this very progressive law which basically allows everyone to identify their own gender, and also identifies a third gender," he said.
"Is it implemented entirely? Of course not. But it's only been four years since the legislative change started happening."
- 'Associated with poetry' -
Before the British established their Indian Empire in the 19th century, trans people were not marginalised, said Sadiq.
"They were associated with art and poetry, they were the ones asked to teach manners to royals, to educate princes and princesses -- that was their space in society," he said.
Today, trans people in Pakistan "don't live as freely as they would perhaps in France", he added.
"But nor is it like it might be in the imagination of somebody who thinks: 'Muslim world'. At some level, they are freer than what you might anticipate," he added.
"Joyland" makes clear that the challenges for the trans community are broadly similar to those faced by cisgender women in Pakistan, where heterosexual men get to explore their desires, unlike everybody else.
"It's pretty terrible for anybody who is not a straight man," said Sadiq.
But he quickly added: "It's the same in the rest of the world, there's no country in the world where a straight man is not at the top of the pile."
There is, however, one crucial difference between cisgender and transgender women: "Women are fighting against their domestication and for trans women it's almost the other way around, they're fighting for a place at home. They're fighting to stay with their families, to not have to be on the streets," Sadiq said.
And while trans women are a familiar sight in streets in Pakistan, "unfortunately they'll be begging, or whatever".
- 'Everybody can relate' -
The film's trans dancer character, Biba, is played by Alina Khan who is herself a transgender woman.
Through an NGO she auditioned, without being a professional actress, for a role in Sadiq's 2019 short film "Darling", got the part, and continued working with him.
"My character Biba and I share a similar struggle," Khan told AFP. "But Biba is angrier than I am."
Khan, who saw "Joyland" for the first time at the Cannes festival, said she felt proud and emotional during the screening.
"I tried to keep it together because I didn't want to make a mess, but the reception was overwhelming. Some people in the audience started crying and I then I couldn't help myself, so I cried, too," she said.
She expects the film to find a receptive audience once released in Pakistan.
"It's an ensemble film that deals with men, women, and gender politics and issues of various kinds that almost everybody can relate to," she said. "It's going to be interesting for the audience back home."
Khan said the film's main takeaway for transgender people was: "People from the trans community can do anything they want to do, just like any man or any woman".
C.Cassis--PC