- Hello, and welcome to a special Q and A recording
of "Lift Like a Girl," one of the 50 official titles
at the 45th Toronto International Film Festival.
As part of "Share Her Journey,"
TIFF's commitment to supporting women
behind and in front of the camera,
we are thrilled to spotlight the incredible films by women
at this year's festival, including "Lift Like a Girl."
My name is Kiva Reardon,
and I'm the lead programmer of Contemporary World Cinema.
And I'm thrilled to be here with Mayye Zayed.
Mayye is a director, cinematographer, editor, and producer
from Alexandria, Egypt.
She studied telecommunications and electronics engineering
at Alexandria University,
before becoming a Fulbright scholar,
studying cinema and media
at Wellesley College in Massachusetts,
and documentary film at MIT.
She co-directed and co-wrote "The Mice Room,"
and directed the short, "A Stroll Down Sunflower Lane."
"Lift Like a Girl" is her feature documentary debut.
I would also like to thank you, our audiences,
for joining us here today.
As an organization still impacted by COVID,
we need the support of our audiences
so that we can continue to present films
to future generations.
And of course, most importantly,
this film is eligible for the People's Choice Award,
and you can vote for your favorite films at tiff.net/vote.
Mayye, thank you so much for joining us.
- Thank you, Kiva, for having me.
- I have a really silly question,
but I realized I have never asked you
if you yourself ever did weightlifting.
- No, never, never.
I actually have an injury in my neck,
so I don't think I'm even allowed to do it.
But, yeah.
But I think, after spending all these years with the girls,
I think I know the technique.
- (laughs) Well, I did also read in an interview
that you gave, that you were really inspired
by Nahla Ramadan, Captain Ramadan's daughter.
Can you tell us a bit about that?
- Well, actually back in 2003,
when Nahla won the World Championships,
I was just a teenager.
And, that story of that girl
training in the streets of Alexandria with her father
was so touching and inspiring,
that I was following this story in the news, everywhere,
and reading more and more about it.
And in a way, Nahla was my hero
because she like inspired me to do the unconventional things
that you wouldn't really
grow up believing that you can do them.
- And how did you actually end up meeting Zebiba?
'Cause there's so many women and girls training
at Captain Ramadan's gym.
What was that process like?
- Well, actually, because
the training space where they are trained,
that we see in the film, is in the middle of the streets
in front of the Harbor.
So it's a very busy street.
So everybody basically sees them,
whenever you're going to work or whatever.
And, one day a friend of mine,
who's also the second unit director
told me about this place, and I was like,
"Oh, we have to go there."
And then I started meeting with them,
with Captain Ramadan and the girls,
and I just fell in love with them completely.
And this is how it all started.
- And was Zebiba someone you had met right away, or was it,
'cause she's not, and I don't mean this as an insult,
but she's not necessarily the top lifter
at the very beginning,
which makes her journey so incredible.
So what drew you to her as the protagonist for the film?
- Well, I mean, at the beginning
I was filming all the girls.
I was interested in their stories,
but I knew that I wanted to be with one girl.
So at the beginning I was focusing on three girls.
Zebiba was one of them.
And, for some reason, I felt I could relate more to Zebiba,
and she was the girl who was starting the journey.
So I felt that, okay, it would be nice to follow her
from point zero till she makes it or not.
But, yeah.
- And, you filmed over four years, from she's 14 to 18.
- Yeah.
And, the relationships at the gym are so intense,
and it's such a, it's like its own world and ecosystem.
So what was it like absorbing into the gym,
and into that world for so long?
And how did you do that (laughs)?
- I mean, like I was, when we were going there,
we were really a very minimal crew.
It was just me and the DP,
and sometimes the second unit director.
So I was also recording sound.
So, I think after some time,
they basically just got used to us,
and we became part of this community
that even now, I go and visit them without filming.
But because I really believe that
we built strong relationship that I'm really happy with.
- And I know you were saying you had a really small crew,
and I wanted to talk about the editing process as well.
You must've just had so much footage to begin with.
- Yes, that's true.
- After filming for four years (laughs).
And then you worked with Sara Abdallah,
who had also edited "Exterior Night,"
which was at TIFF a few years ago, 2018,
so it's sort of nice to have those common threads.
But, yeah, can you talk about that editing process,
and how you even, yeah, where you even began
with so much footage?
- Well, I mean, first of all,
this is the first film that I don't edit myself,
but I knew from the beginning that I didn't want to do that
because it's such, you know,
because I'm directing it, producing it.
So, it makes no sense to be also the editor.
And I really liked Sara's work,
especially in fiction films, like "Exterior Night."
And I kinda knew that I wanted to work with an editor
who has good experience in working in narrative films,
because I had this idea that I want to build,
or to edit the film in a way
that a narrative film would be edited.
And so, yeah, so we basically,
we started that by giving her all the footage.
And Sara's based in Cairo, I'm based in Alexandria,
and we would meet like
five days or a week, every month
for a year and a half basically.
And we would spend this week working on the edit.
We started by editing scenes, scene by scene.
I started by the scenes that I felt were close to me,
and I knew that they were the most important scenes.
Like one of them is,
we started with this one scene where,
where Sara edited it in a way,
and send it to me that I really like, I was so amazed.
I was so happy, that I couldn't believe
that she could manage to basically
have a whole day of filming into this three minute scene.
And I just loved it.
And this scene made it to the film the way it is.
It was never changed afterwards.
We worked a lot later on other scenes.
But the process was like, I would go for a week,
and then come back to Alexandria.
And Sara would work remotely, like in Cairo,
and then we would meet again.
And that helped in me having,
in having a fresh eye all the time,
just to be able to say if this something is working,
and this is not.
And yeah, we kept on working.
And at some point we even decided
to re-edit the whole film again.
And that was when-- - Oh, wow.
- Yeah, and that's, we were attending the documentary lab
and film independent in LA last year.
And we were like, "Okay, let's re-edit it again."
And I think Sara is really like a great editor,
who always have these ideas,
and she's very focused.
And she could help a lot when I was drifting away.
Because, as a director, you would want a certain moment,
or a certain scene, but if it's not helping the whole story,
then it had to go.
And Sara was very precise about that.
- I imagine that would be so helpful too,
when you've been so close,
so close to the protagonist of the story for so long,
to have a bit of an outside perspective.
And I think, in an interview,
it said you had about 90 hours of footage.
Is that right?
- Yeah, I think from 90 to 100, yeah.
- Wow, yeah, I can't imagine what didn't make it (laughs).
Sorry, we shouldn't focus on that (laughs).
But, I did also want to ask about getting the film made.
Again, in another interview, you were saying,
You didn't want to, I guess, didn't want to rush,
didn't want to just finish it and have it done.
And then you ended up founding your own production company,
Cleo Media, to actually produce the film,
which isn't all that common for,
or maybe it is, I'm not sure,
for first time features, but it seems,
it reminded me of Agnes Varda,
like setting up her own production company
right off the top.
Can you just talk a bit about that,
as an independent filmmaker,
and why that was important to you?
- Well, for me, I was a partner
in a collective called Rufy's Films for six years.
I worked there from 2013 to 2019
and we made great films together.
But I felt that, now I think I need to take another step,
where I focus on female driven content, production,
where I focus on projects with women in front
and behind the camera, because I think that's really needed.
And, as a woman, I feel that I can relate more
to these stories.
So I felt that it's better that I have this company
who doesn't only like make or produce my own films,
but also help other female filmmakers.
- Thank you for that.
I was also thinking, as you were speaking
about sort of that creative freedom,
and you had said, again,
I was reading all the interviews with you to prepare,
that you were interested in kind of breaking down that line
between documentary and fiction.
- Yes.
- And you had mentioned that in the editing process as well,
you wanted it to feel like a fictional structure.
Can you talk a bit about that,
and whether you hope to keep pursuing that as well?
- Well, I don't know, it's just,
I think, because I'm interested in fiction films
as much as I'm interested in documentary films.
And I feel that it's the story that decides
which way you would make it.
So for example, in "Lift Like a Girl,"
I cannot imagine this film as a narrative film,
because then it would lose a lot of its credibility.
It's a total different story
if you know that this character is fictional,
but if you know that she's real, and she's there,
and she's been doing this all the time,
as well as Captain Ramadan and the other girls,
then it adds another dimension to the whole story.
But, in terms style, because I like both,
I prefer to make films that are in this gray area,
between the two, and also have some experimental elements,
because I feel that this makes me curious to discover more
while I'm making this project or any other project.
And I feel that this curiosity
is what really drives me forward
to keep trying different things in each project.
But, yeah, I'm always interested
in films that combining all these genres together.
- And speaking of real characters,
I have to ask, is Zebiba still lifting?
Like, what's her, where is she right now (laughs)?
- Yeah, she is still lifting.
I was visiting her actually, I think two weeks ago.
She's now trained by Nahla Ramadan, the coach's daughter,
former World Champion.
And, yeah, I think she's doing well.
She's still training.
- Gosh, I really wish that everyone could have come here
for the premiere and everything.
- Yeah, me too.
- I know, yeah.
And I'm sorry that this is sort of the best we can do
in these COVID circumstances.
But I want to thank you so much for sharing the film
with us and our audiences.
Yeah, and maybe it'll inspire some people
to just start to start lifting.
- Yeah (laughs), I hope so.
Or actually inspire people to do whatever they want to do,
no matter what.
- You're right, yeah.
I was saying that to somebody that it's not,
even if you have no idea what weightlifting is,
there's the level of perseverance and growth
that's captured in this film
resonates whether or not you're a weightlifter or not.
So, yeah.
Thank you so much for making this film,
and again for sharing.
- Thank you, Kiva.
- Thank you.