I Am Nojoom, Age 10 and Divorced

In Yemen, at a time when there was no minimum age for marriage, ten-year-old Nojoom is married off to a man twenty years older than her. For her family the bride price is an income and one fewer mouth to feed. For the girl, life becomes unbearable very quickly. In the end she walks to the courthouse alone, stands in front of a judge and says she wants a divorce. Khadija Al-Salami's film rests on a real case: Nujood Ali's went before the court in 2008 and became one of the turning points in the campaign against child marriage in Yemen. The director was herself married off at eleven and tells this story as somebody who lived it. The film was named best film at the Dubai Film Festival and became the first production Yemen submitted for the foreign language Oscar.