Documentary about Jordanian Bedouin mother to premiere at Human Rights Watch Film Festival in London

A Jordanian Bedouin woman is the focus of Rafea: Solar Mama – a documentary about a mother struggling to bring about social change in the face of overwhelming opposition. The film will premiere at the Human Rights Watch Film Festival in the UK this weekend. Jessica Holland reports

A scene from Rafea: Solar Mama, a documentary about the struggles of a Jordanian Bedouin mother who is chosen to go to college. Courtesy Rafea: Solar Mama

A year ago, The National reported on the Barefoot College, a school in the Indian state of Rajasthan that invites illiterate grandmothers from rural parts of Afghanistan, South Sudan, Peru and elsewhere in the world to take a six-month course on solar engineering, with the intention that they will return home ready to create sustainable electricity systems and pass on their skills.

Now, two Egyptian-born filmmakers have made a documentary about Rafea, a Jordanian Bedouin woman who is chosen for college but is forced to struggle against the prejudices of her unemployed husband and deal with her own feelings about leaving her young children behind.

Rafea is funny, bright and resilient but she faces enormous obstacles as she tries not only to change the economy of her village but also to inspire the women around her to seize control of their lives.

Ahead of its UK premiere at the Human Rights Watch Film Festival in London, Mona Eldaief, one of the -directors of Rafea: Solar Mama, talks about the highs and lows of capturing the story on film.

How has the film been received?

We just showed it in Jordan on International Women’s Day in an enormous theatre and it got a standing ovation. The audience was roaring and crying the whole time. It was amazing.

She is such a magnetic, inspirational character; she just pulls herself up again and again. If she’d been born in a different situation, she would be running a country.

Originally, we were going to follow three women from three different continents, but [Rafea’s] drama happened on the spot while we were filming.

• The Human Rights Watch Film Festival will be held at venues across London from today until March 22. The screening of Rafea: Solar Mama and Q&A with filmmakers will be on Friday and Saturday. Visit www.ff.hrw.org for more details