‘Cotton Queen’ review: Thessaloniki winner is assured debut from Sudanese filmmaker Suzannah Mirghani

Dir/scr: Suzannah Mirghani. Germany/France/Palestine/Egypt/Qatar/Saudi Arabia/Sudan. 2025. 94mins

The future of a Sudanese village is inextricably bound to its colonial past in Cotton Queen. Suzannah Mirghani’s modest debut feature confidently blends coming of age drama and history lesson as a young woman finds herself caught between traditional expectations and new possibilities. A festival journey that began at Venice Critics Week continues to bear fruit with a Best Film win at the Thessaloniki International Film Festival. Mirghani’s engaging storytelling and a compelling central performance from Mihad Murtada should allow it to travel further. 

Confidently blends coming of age drama and history lesson

Sudanaese-Russian filmmaker Mirghani is now the first Sudanese female to write and direct a fiction feature. Cotton Queen, which expands on her 2020 short AI-Sit and features many of the original cast members, also won the ArteKino Award at L’Atelier de la Cinefondation at Cannes in 2022, and builds on Mirghani’s previous exploration of colonialism, family ties and the lives of Sudanese women. 

Nafisa (Mihai Murtada) lives in a small village where the cotton crop is vital. Mirghani constantly emphasises the sense of community in the village: young girls work together picking cotton, relax in the cool waters of the Nile and gossip about the future. The men sit around listening to music. The vivid sunsets and sun-kissed fields lend a timeless quality to a story that is deliberately removed from the violent conflicts that continue to mark Sudan. (Filming took place in Egypt.)

Nafisa has her heart set on Babiker (Talaat Fareed), a humble farmer who grows onions. Yet the possibility of a life with him is threatened by the expectations placed on Nafisa by her family. Her battle-scarred grandmother Al-Sit ( Rabha Mohamed Mahmoud) is the leader of the village – known as the ’Cotton Queen’, she is respected as the woman who fought off British rulers to secure the village’s future. She has a survivor’s luxury of telling stories that nobody can challenge or refute.

Life in the village changes with the arrival of Nadir (Hassan Kassala), a smart-suited businessman who has big plans to introduce genetically modified cotton. The women of the village regard him as a prize catch for their daughters. In many respects, it feels as if a colonialist history is repeating itself with another outsider trying to assume ownership of the land and its riches. Nadir stays in what is known locally as ’the English house’, a long-abandoned building from the colonialist era complete with dusty rooms, four-poster beds and relics of a different age.

Mirghani gradually builds a sense of the pressures on Nafisa as she realises that her own desires may well be sacrificed for what is considered the greater good of the village. Her mother Aisha (Haram Bisheer) and grandmother all have plans that pay little heed to what Nafisa wants.

Mirghani successfully provides historical context whilst exploring the motivations of everyone involved, and the need for Nafisa to assert her independence. A finely balanced narrative finds the complexity in everyone’s seemingly good intentions. Mahmoud brings an impish charm to Al-Sit, whose velvety manner masks the steely hold she maintains on the village. The past she has constructed may be unreliable, but there is little doubt that the sacrifices she made brought their rewards.

The film also conveys the way in which past and present sit side by side in the village. People still believe in the power of soothsayers, fortune tellers and powerful medicines but there is a also a conviction that some practices are best confined to history – especially female genital mutilation.

Murtada’s understated, imposing performance seems perfectly attuned to the challenges faced by Nafisa as she tries to navigate conflicting demands and expectations. The pressures on her may be considerable, but her quiet determination to face them down makes for an appealing heroine.