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Queer Arab Joy, Love and Cinema with Naures Sager & Michael Detlef
Friday, 19 December, 2025
This episode is in English. Please croll down for tips and links. Welcome to SAQMI Play, the podcast that features queer artists, filmmakers and their work. For more information look in to SAQMIs homepage where you can see films and read more about the artists. In this episode we feature a conversation with The Uneven production. A company co-founded by filmmaker Naures Sager and creative producer Michael Detlef, where their creative collaboration is shaped by their partnership in life and shared values. Their work centres queer SWANA perspectives, and builds a cinematic language grounded in relationality, emotional depth, and a refusal to reduce identity to stereotype. Their films carry a sense of dynamism, intimacy, humour, and vulnerability. This fifteenth edition, curated by Anna Linder, took place at SAQMI’s headquarters Frigga in Gothenburg on May 29, 2024, and featured a screening of films followed by a live conversation with Naures and Michael, moderated by Careen Koleilat. Read more about the event here: Nightfall - Queer Talks and Screenings #15 - Naures Sager. The films screened at the event was: 1-1 (2020, 7 min) by Naures Sager Ayman’s sex date with Jonas gets crashed by his friends Amirah and Samir which takes a positive turn. Habib & The Thief (2021, 15 min) by Naures Sager Habib and The Thief is a sexy police and thief game between two Arab men and the thing they fear the most – a threat from the Arab world. A Queer Bird in the Middle East (2024, 17 min) by Naures Sager & Michael Detlef The Iraqi-Swedish director Naures Sager travels around the Middle East to explore his roots, accompanied by his boyfriend Michael. Back in Sweden, he receives warnings from his concerned family about the potential consequences of being gay in an Arab country. + Work in progress - a talk about upcoming productions from The Uneven production company. The uneven stands for everything that is unbalanced in society. WE SEE THE UNEVEN - IT'S TIME TO GET EVEN! Read more about the productions company The Uneven + see a lot of films, clips and documentations. Naures Sager is an Iraqi-Swedish screenwriter, director, and producer. He earned a BA in Film Production from University West in 2008. Together with his partner Michael Detlef, Naures co-founded The Uneven, a production company that creates films focusing on LGBTQIA+ issues and MENA characters. Naures has directed the short films 1–1 and Habib & The Thief, as well as the short documentary A Queer Bird in the Middle East. These films have toured international film festivals and have been broadcast on SVT. Naures has received the Best Project Award at the Haugesund Film Festival. He has participated in the Talent Project Market at Berlinale and the Producers Network at the Festival de Cannes. He serves on the nomination committee for Best Short Film at Guldbaggen (2023–2025). He also worked as an assistant director to Daniel Sawka on the feature film Love and Other Diagnoses (2026). Naures has released his debut single, Mako Mithli, an iraqi queer anthem. Michael Detlef is a Danish-German producer and production designer. He co-founded the production company The Uneven in 2019 and has produced the short films 1–1 and Habib & The Thief, as well as the short documentary A Queer Bird in the Middle East. These films have toured international film festivals and have been broadcast on SVT. Michael has participated in the Producer’s Network at the Cannes Film Festival, the Talent Project Market at Berlinale, and the Feature Film Program led by Film i Skåne. He co-produced the documentary Born to Fight (2026) with Tambo Film in Denmark and worked as a junior producer on the feature film Love and Other Diagnoses (2026) at Anagram Sweden. Careen Koleilat is a Lebanese-Palestinian trans filmmaker and artistic researcher exploring diaspora, sensory storytelling and new relations between audience and filmmaker. With 17 years of international practice and as co-founder of Blue Fox Studios, they merge film, sound, and decolonial approaches to create immersive, dialogic, and boundary-crossing film informed spaces. Credits SAQMI Play: Producer: Anna Linder Design and code: Vincent Orback Composer: Amanda Lindgren Recorded by Silas Lilo Jensen Edited by Jessica Klingsell Host: Careen Koleilat Original: Nightfall #15, at SAQMI space Frigga, Gothenburg. Publisher: Anna Linder
