25 Cats From Qatar

LOGLINE:
Multi-national rescuers in Qatar team up with a cat cafe owner from middle America to rescue 25 cats amidst a population crisis.

SYNOPSIS:
Every country in the world grapples with animal welfare, and the feral cat overpopulation crisis is especially grim. Given the universal lack of government resources, the burden falls upon volunteer rescuers to deal with the uphill battle of caring for the ever growing population of cats.

The crisis has reached a breaking point in Doha, capital city of Qatar. The oil-producing nation is one of the world’s wealthiest. However, the luxurious surface and rapid growth are powered by migrant workers who comprise 89% of the population, and end up volunteering their resources to help alleviate the suffering among the nation’s many street cats who struggle to survive the extreme heat, diseases and traffic.

One such volunteer is Umair Khan, a construction manager from Pakistan who secretly harbors 50 cats in a makeshift shelter at his workplace and spends his nights caring for cat colonies all over the city. He and his fellow volunteers keep running up against the same problem: in a transient population, it’s almost impossible to find local adopters for these animals.

7,000 miles away in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, veteran flight attendant and cat cafe operator Katy McHugh becomes aware of the crisis in Doha via social media. Katy hatches an unsanctioned rescue plan with Umair and his fellow volunteers to fly 25 cats back to Wisconsin, where the cat cafe provides a pipeline for easy adoption.

Upon arrival, Katy has just 4 days to meet the Doha rescuers, select the cats from their makeshift shelters, and get the cats cleared for customs. Katy is forced to make difficult and heartbreaking choices to select the final 25 felines, all the while learning more about the culture and history of Qatar, and how the crisis built to this inflection point.

Presenting Qatar as a microcosm of a global crisis, 25 Cats from Qatar asks searching questions about the role of public and private players in animal welfare, all within a ticking-clock narrative about the nuts and bolts of a rescue mission. From the filmmakers behind the award winning CAT DADDIES, the film is both an urgent wake-up call and a heartwarming portrayal of strangers overcoming international barriers to reach a common goal.

  • Mye Hoang
    Director
    Cat Daddies
  • Dave Boyle
    Producer
    Netflix's House of Ninjas
  • Alex Megaro
    Producer
    VICE's doc series Source Material
  • Eman Akram Nader
    Producer
  • Project Type:
    Documentary, Feature
  • Runtime:
    1 hour 35 minutes
  • Completion Date:
    September 20, 2024
  • Production Budget:
    200,000 USD
  • Country of Origin:
    United States, United States
  • Country of Filming:
    United States, Qatar, United States
  • Language:
    English
  • Shooting Format:
    4K
  • Aspect Ratio:
    16:9
  • Film Color:
    Color
  • First-time Filmmaker:
    No
  • Student Project:
    No
Director Biography - Mye Hoang

Director and editor Mye Hoang is a Los Angeles based producer/director and Texas native. Her previous documentary CAT DADDIES won numerous awards such as the Tallgrass Film Festival’s Excellence in the Art of Film, Newport Beach Film Festival’s Outstanding Achievement in Documentary, and the Dallas International Film Festival’s Audience Award (2021). It has been distributed in over a dozen territories around the world. She was a producer on the narrative feature I WILL MAKE YOU MINE by Lynn Chen (SXSW 2020), as well as award-winning noir thriller MAN FROM RENO (Best Feature at the LA Film Festival and Spirit Award Nominee 2014). She has directed numerous narrative short films that have been showcased internationally. Her first narrative feature VIETTE, an Asian American coming-of-age story, debuted in 2012 and toured film festivals around the country.

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Director Statement

When I was touring with my previous documentary CAT DADDIES (2022), I met a cat cafe owner in Milwaukee and learned about her international rescue work. As a lifelong cat owner, I was aware of the efforts to help pets from abroad find homes in the US – some came from conflict areas or natural disasters, understandably. But coming 7,000 miles from stable countries like Qatar didn’t make much sense to me. How could there be no culture of adoption in an entire nation, much less a very wealthy one?

This curiosity set me on my new film 25 CATS FROM QATAR, to discover the country and its culture, and why animal rescuers there have reached a breaking point. They are literally unable to solicit support from within and feel they have no choice but to turn outside, to the UK and US. Some of the rescuers in Qatar declined to participate in the film for fear of being ostracized, and others were very frank and candid, so I felt a deep responsibility to share their story.

To immerse the audience, I wanted to shoot in a verité style and allow the story to unfold in the rapid week-long shoot that we had. I focused on all the nuts and bolts of this unsanctioned rescue mission. I knew that witnessing the tedious preparation and the selection process of 25 cats in all its totality would be ultimately moving. Being able to document this grand act of love for animals has been one of the most rewarding experiences in my life, and I hope cat rescuers will receive the attention and support that has been long overdue.