Tunisian filmmaker Afef Ben Mahmoud to lead Gabès Cinéma Festival 2026

Tunisian actress and filmmaker Afef Ben Mahmoud has been appointed director of the eighth edition of Tunisia’s Gabès Cinema Festival (Gabès Cinéma Fen), an event celebrating cinema, video art, and immersive visual works.

Launched in 2019, the festival also engages with the ecological challenges facing Gabès, a Mediterranean port city affected by an aging phosphate fertilizer factory, using cinema and art as tools to reflect on the city’s future.

Ben Mahmoud is internationally known for her roles in Nouri Bouzid’s The Scarecrows, Mehdi Hmili’s Streams, and most recently Mohamed Ali Nahdi’s boxing drama Round 13.

She made her directorial debut in 2023 with Backstage, co-directed with Khalil Benkirane, which premiered in the Venice parallel sidebar Giornate degli Autori.

“This choice comes at a pivotal moment for Gabès Cinéma Fen, which continues its aesthetic exploration and further solidifies its position as an independent festival, open to the free forms of cinema and artistic creation,” the festival said.

Ben Mahmoud said she accepted the role because the festival reflects her own artistic journey across disciplines.

“My work has always navigated between different forms of expression – performing arts, acting, directing, producing – and the festival embodies precisely this cross-disciplinary approach,” she said.

She added, “The festival becomes a space for collective reflection and shared imagination,” particularly in a region facing significant social and environmental challenges.

Gabès Cinéma Fen will take place from April 26 to May 2.