by Gill Pringle in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia
“I think filmmakers have to put our foot down. I can’t comment on what’s going to happen with the whole Netflix/WB thing – and I don’t think any of us should be commenting on it yet until we know exactly how it’s going to play out.
“We should not be reducing theatrical windows. We should be expanding them. We really should be. I don’t understand why it can’t run an extra month because of streaming money?! What’s wrong with keeping something in a place where it’s the only way you can see this film and this is how a filmmaker wants you to see this film.
“And everybody else who doesn’t want that, then they can wait for it.
“I think with my next film – and I don’t care what happens – I’m going to get a 100-day theatrical window. I’ve already put it out on twitter, so I’ve got to commit!
“When you go directly to streaming, it diminishes the importance of a film, whereas the theatrical experience elevates the importance. The way you present it to the world is a very important thing.
“I think we have to literally support the film business. Audiences have to be reminded that they will lose their theatres if they don’t attend,” urges the Anora writer/director, who adds that the Oscar winner’s biggest audience was Gen Z.
“Which I would never have expected. I was told that Gen Z don’t even go to the movies anymore. But that’s not true,” says Baker who is serving as Jury President of this year’s 5th edition of RSIFF, presiding over 15 films in competition from Asia, Africa and the Arab world.
Baker is clearly at home spending long days at the cinema. “I love attending festivals because I get to see films that perhaps I wouldn’t be able to see any other way – or meet the Oscar entries from certain countries. So, my choice [to be here] came from my own selfish cinephilia.”
Impressed by the emerging culture of Saudi filmmakers, he confesses to a particular fondness for Iranian cinema, citing the films of Amir Naderi.
“His work means a lot to me and, for those who have seen The Runner, you can probably see its influence on The Florida Project and maybe even my latest film, Left-Handed Girl,” he says of Shih-Ching Tsou’s solo directorial debut, a Taiwanese film which he co-produced, co-produced and edited.
“Also, festival competitions really do have a major impact on the lives and careers of the winners. I know that from personal experience. My career wouldn’t exist without film festivals.
“I also love the fact that there are cash rewards here. It’s meaningful. It truly is. Independent film, film in general, it’s a struggle. And I know my life was basically saved back in the day when I was winning cash awards – when they still existed in the US.
“I want to help elevate new voices and filmmakers that are emerging in any way I can – because I needed help back in the day and that’s what got me here.”
Reflecting on his own career, he says, “I grew up with Hollywood mainstream movies. That’s what shaped me – the whole Spielberg world, Lucas, all that. And that shaped me up until mid high school I believe. Then I became aware of – and this was back way before the internet – whatever VHS tapes I could rent from my local video store or library. When I started becoming aware of world cinema, I think I immediately fell in love with Italian no-realism and British social realism. Those were the two that really shaped me right while I was interning in my NYU college years.
“I went into NYU thinking I was going to make the next Robocop or Die Hard and I left NYU thinking I was going to make the next Naked or Secrets and Lies,” says Baker, 54, who later cut his teeth by doing wedding videos, freelance production work or corporate gigs.
“But when I look back, it was all so incredibly valuable, learning all the technical side of things like editing and lighting,” says the filmmaker.
Ask how his four-time Oscar fame sits today, he reveals, “actually just in the last month I’ve had time to really start thinking about it because, literally, within 36 hours after the Oscars, Samantha Quan, my wife and fellow producer – who won an Academy award herself that night – we were on a plane to Tokyo because the movie was opening there.
“We had already booked this trip and we wanted to celebrate and relax but we were right off to Tokyo to promote it and then after that, right into Left-Handed Girl which premiered in Critics Weeks at Cannes this year.
“So, there was really no slowing down until just recently I have been able to reflect and it’s a beautiful thing.
“We’re very happy with what happened with Anora because we never expected it, honestly. We went into it thinking this would be the most divisive film and when the Palme d’Or happened it was my dream come true. It was an incredible night that we could never have seen coming and so I thought that was it. That was the win.
“And we were flying back from France and my phone started blowing up, people texting me and saying: get ready for the next eight months of your life; it’s going to be crazy,” he recalls, referring to the exhaustive time put into an Oscar campaign.
“And honestly, it was like a nervous breakdown on the plane because I’m like: ‘OMG I thought it was over. I thought this was it!’ So, it’s been quite a journey with this movie.”
Ask if his film budgets will now quadruple after a lifetime as a dogged guerrilla indie filmmaker, he says, “I think the opportunities are there – whether we’ll take them or not, that’s the question. Because I’ve been in this world for so long and we got to a place with Anora where I was working with such an incredible team. The outcome was so incredible, and why not try to repeat that?
“I’m not going to go for the US$150 million studio thing. I’m going to stay in this world. We like to make films independently, so the next one will probably be around the size of Anora, somewhere in that general area. And also, stay in the same wheelhouse in terms of story and content.
“In the US, people – like everywhere else in the world – are struggling and those who are marginalised are struggling even more. And those are stories that I am drawn to because I want to shine a light on it, and also, I never see the other side of things in the US. I see very white-washed stories while there are subcultures and microcosms that never have any representation whatsoever. But I’m also tackling universal themes and that’s done on purpose because I want audiences all over the world to be moved and to connect and to feel seen.
“These are human struggles. We’re all going through the same stuff. We all have dreams and disappointments and failures and hardships and all of that stuff – so that’s what’s usually in the core,” says Baker.
“The stories I want to tell would never be green-lit by a major studio, so I have to do them independently,” he says.
Despite having shot three films on the i-phone, today he is a huge lover of film. “Kodak is the last company producing film and I always tell my filmmaker friends – if you have the budget [to shoot on film], do it,” he says.
Main Image: Head of 2025 Jury Sean Baker at the Red Sea International Film Festival 2025 on December 04, 2025 in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia. Photo by Tristan Fewings/Getty Images for The Red Sea International Film Festival
