The Prix RÉALS aim to recognize ARRQ members who have demonstrated daring, originality, and/or taken creative and narrative risks in their work, or in a part of their work (such as a scene, title sequence, technological innovation, shot, etc.) that was broadcast over the past year.
Winner of the 2023 Prix RÉAL - Documentary work
Canada representative in the race for the Academy Award for Best International Feature Film 2024
ROJEK meets incarcerated members of the Islamic State, and their wives detained in prison camps, from all over the world and sharing a common ideal: to establish a caliphate. Confronted with the fundamentalist beliefs of the jihadists, the film attempts to trace the beginning, the rise and the fall of the Islamic State (IS) through their personal stories. These conversations constitute the common thread of the documentary through which various sequences describing post-war Syrian Kurdistan intertwine.
Zaynê Akyol
A graduate of UQAM's École des médias, Zaynê Akyol won the Best Emerging Documentary Filmmaker Award presented by the René-Malo Chair, associated with the National Film Board of Canada. She also completed a Master’s degree in Communications, with a specialization in cinema, focusing her research on relational and creative issues in documentary film. Juggling theory and practice, it was in 2016 that she directed her first feature-length documentary, Gulîstan, Land of Roses. This personal work was noticed by several international festivals and garnered over 80 selections, 50 nominations and 12 awards, including the prestigious Doc Alliance Award at the Locarno Film Festival. She also directed a second film on Kurdish territory, ROJEK, which won the Special Jury Prize at Hot Docs in 2022. Full of courage and determination, Zaynê Akyol says she wants to be a source of inspiration for young filmmakers, especially Middle Eastern women, so that they can realize their dreams and leave their mark on society.
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