Scythia Films and Good Question Media have tapped Lula Ali Ismaïl (Dhalinyaro) to direct their next feature, Nuur.

Adapted from the novel The Youth of God by Hassan Ghedi Santur, who also wrote the script, the film will be produced by Daniel Bekerman (The Apprentice, The Witch), Chris Yurkovich (Slash/Back) and Lara Saliba under the Good Question Media banner in association with Scythia Films.

Jordan Hart (I, Object), Michael Bronner (The Mauritanian, Captain Phillips) and Bhakti Shringarpure of Smashing Dandelions will be executive-producing. Telefilm Canada is funding the production.

Set in Toronto’s Somali community Dixon, the film centres on a sensitive and academically gifted 17-year-old boy as he negotiates between the calling of his faith, his intellectual ambitions and troubled family life.

Omar Abdi (The Gravedigger’s Wife) and Hamza Fouad (Riverdale) are attached to star.

Ali Ismaïl is a Canadian-Djiboutian director, producer, screenwriter and actress whose first feature, Dhalinyaro (Youth) was the first film to come out of Djibouti and earned her the nickname of “the first lady of Djiboutian cinema,” according to a news release.

“[Nuur] is close to my heart because it will allow me to show the specific and the universal experience of Somali migration from within, having been part of it myself, and to authentically document the experiences of those who struggle to feel good in a new place,” said Ali Ismaïl in a statement.

Image courtesy of Good Question Media