Baab

Dir. Nayla al Khaja. 2026, 97min. United Arab Emirates. In Arabic, with English subtitles. DCP. With Shaimaa El Fadul, Huda Alghanem, Meera Almidfa. Haunted by the unceasing hum of tinnitus in her left ear and sudden death of her twin sister, Wahida (El Fadul) goes to the remote Ras Al-Khaimah mountains to find solace. Instead, she comes across an eerie green door in her sister’s locked bedroom that seems to blur the line between reality and fantasy, and the living and the dead. In Nayla Al Khaja’s dark fairy tale, an immersive exploration of grief, the audience is plunged into Wahida’s shattered mind, and seemingly ordinary domestic spaces are transformed into an emotional landscape of fear and trauma. Even scarier than the film’s psychological horror-trip is the fact that it has been so hard to see outside of the region in which it was made. Despite al Khaja’s breakthrough talent as the first female Emirati filmmaker, the delighted reviews out of Baab’s premiere at the Cairo International Film Festival, a theatrical run throughout the MENA world, and a collaboration with two-time Oscar award-winning Indian film composer A.R. Rahman, Baab has never been invited to screen in the US…until now! Tickets: $17.50 / $12 senior and students / $10 youth / free for MoMI members. There is a $1.50 transaction fee per ticket for all online purchases. The cost of admission may be applied toward a same-day purchase of a membership. Order tickets. Please pick up tickets at the Museum’s admissions desk upon arrival. All seating is general admission.