Red Sea Film Festival<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\tThe big-budget epic, directed by British filmmaker Rupert Wyatt (\u201cRise of the Planet of the Apes\u201d), is set in 7th-century Arabia and revolves around a princess (Hart) who refuses to serve as concubine to the ruthless emperor Kisra, played by Ben Kingsley, prompting an epic showdown called the Battle of Ze Qar. Copley plays the ruthless mercenary commander Jalabzeen tasked by the emperor with hunting down the proto-feminist princess and her father as they flee into the vast Arabian desert.<\/p>\n
\n\tThe reactions from the home crowd at the \u201cDesert Warrior\u201d premiere were warm and \u201creally vocal\u201d said Hart, speaking at the Variety Lounge presented by Red Sea Film Festival.<\/p>\n
\n\t\u201cIt\u2019s nice to show it to an audience that understands the culture,\u201d added Hart, who has\u00a0dual British-Saudi heritage. She pointed out that the film\u2019s story is very well-known \u201cin this part of the world.\u201d \u201cSo I think there was a deeper understanding and an appreciation that was really lovely to be a part of.\u201d <\/p>\n
\n\tFor Copley, being in \u201cDesert Warrior\u201d meant witnessing a real statement of intent from the Saudi industry. Though he did not really the feel the pressure of that, \u201cyou could definitely feel it on the production, on the director, on Rupert, on the producer and the studio trying to handle the beast of the first big film shot in the region,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
\n\t\u201cThey flew in what was a 550-something crew and 250 drove in from surrounding region, because there was no industry, so you could feel it making the movie. You could feel just the practical weight of trying to create an industry where they were, there isn\u2019t one,\u201d he added. <\/p>\n
\n\t\u201cWe had 38 nations represented on the crew, which was just wild,\u201d Copley noted. \u201cIt was definitely the most languages that I\u2019ve ever come across on a film [shoot].\u201d<\/p>\n
\n\tShooting in the desert clearly had its drawbacks and rewards.<\/p>\n
\n\t\u201cI think for me getting into the character was more a physical thing,\u201d said Hart. \u201cWe actually started shooting around August or September, so it was still very, very hot.\u201d<\/p>\n
\n\t\u201cAnd, you know, we had quite heavy costumes on, with lots of layers. That\u2019s when you realise the use of sweat. Why the body sweats. Because you sweat and then some wind comes along, and you\u2019re like: \u201cOh,
that\u2019s pleasant!\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
\u2018 The preceding article may include information circulated by third parties \u2019 <\/em><\/p>\n \u2018 Some details of this article were extracted from the following source variety.com \u2019 <\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"In 2021, Sharlto Copley (\u201cDistrict 9,\u201d \u201cThe Witcher\u201d) and Aiysha Hart (\u201cMogul Mowgli,\u201d \u201cColette\u201d) spent five months in a scenic desert area near the site of the futuristic city of NEOM to shoot Saudi Arabia\u2019s first Hollywood-style tentpole movie, \u201cDesert Warrior.\u201d Almost five years later it is now finally launching in the Middle East from […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":2191698,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"jnews-multi-image_gallery":[],"jnews_single_post":[],"jnews_primary_category":[],"jnews_social_meta":[],"footnotes":""},"categories":[25173],"tags":[423076,401847,423077],"class_list":["post-2191697","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-artists","tag-desert-warrior","tag-red-sea-film-festival","tag-variety-lounge-red-sea-2025"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/12\/Desert-Warrior-Stars-on-Pioneering-Hollywood-Style-Production.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2191697","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2191697"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2191697\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2191699,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2191697\/revisions\/2191699"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2191698"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2191697"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2191697"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2191697"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}