The People & The House
About
Fenti
A filmmaker and the production house she built — both rooted in Sudan, operating on the world stage.
Sara Suliman
Sara Suliman is a UK-based Sudanese filmmaker, Chevening scholar, researcher, producer, and director — and in 2024 was selected as a BFI DocSociety / ScreenSkills “Producing Truth” participant.
She is the founder of Fenti Productions, an independent film production house she established in Sudan and expanded to the United Kingdom in 2025. Her practice is rooted in the intersection of body politics, gender, history, and resistance, with a particular focus on the stories of women whose lives and contributions have been dismissed or erased.
Her debut feature documentary, Heroic Bodies, premiered at the International Documentary Film Festival Amsterdam (IDFA) in 2022, where it was showcased in the “Frontlight” section — marking the first Sudanese feature film ever selected in an IDFA section. The film went on to win the Audience Award at the Malmö Arab Film Festival (2023), the Shireen Abu Akleh Award for Best Documentary at the Jerusalem Arab Film Festival, and has screened at festivals across Europe, the Arab world, and Africa.
Beyond directing, Sara serves as a voice for African cinema on the international stage. She has served as a jury member at the Documentary Film Competition at the Oran Film Festival in Algeria, and on the juries for the Official Short Films Competition and Carthage for Emerging Cinema at the 36th Carthage Film Festival in Tunis.
Her work consistently asks who gets to tell their own story — and insists on the answer being: everyone.
Fenti Productions
Fenti Productions is an independent film production house founded in Sudan by Sara Suliman. In 2025, the company expanded its operations by opening a branch in the United Kingdom, enabling broader collaboration across European co-productions and international distribution networks.
The company led the production of Heroic Bodies, an award-winning Sudanese documentary that premiered at IDFA — one of the world's largest and most prestigious documentary film festivals. The film's international journey, from Amsterdam to Jerusalem to Malmö, established Fenti Productions as a serious voice in global documentary cinema.
Fenti Productions has also been involved in producing a series of short films for international organisations and NGOs, including UNMAS and UNITAMS. Among these is a documentary capturing the first humanitarian demining training for females in Sudan — documenting how trainees learned to identify and safely operate in environments containing real landmines, highlighting the courage of women entering a field traditionally dominated by men.
The company offers a full suite of production services — from documentary and feature film production to NGO media, advocacy storytelling, cinematography, post-production, and executive line production for international shoots in Sudan and the region.