Red Sea Film Foundation’s longtime managing director steps down

The architect of Saudi Arabia’s flagship film festival is stepping aside. Shivani Pandya Malhotra has resigned as managing director of the Red Sea Film Foundation, the body behind the Red Sea International Film Festival, ending a seven-year run that began before the first edition.

A foundational hire: Pandya Malhotra joined in early 2019, barely two years after the Kingdom lifted its decades-long cinema ban. She was central to building the first international film festival from scratch, growing it from a makeshift 2021 debut in Jeddah’s Al Balad into one of the region’s biggest festivals and top film markets in MENA. She was armed with over 25 years of experience in the industry, having previously run the now-defunct Dubai International Film Festival and the Gulf Film Festival.

It looks like an amicable breakup, but is there something more to it? Pandya Malhotra’s tenure overlapped with three foundation CEOs — Mahmoud Sabbagh, Mohammed Al Turki, and current chief Faisal Baltyour. The latter’s vision for the festival direction has reportedly “clashed with Pandya Malhotra’s mode of operation,” unnamed sources told Variety.