Fever Dream
Locked up at a clinic in the sky. حُمى و حُلمْ humeh wa hulum - fever, and dream. How did we get halfway to heaven, and where do we go from here?
A couple is checked into a 20th-floor suite with sea view and sealed windows for a non-optional staycation courtesy of the government. Suspended between realities, the covid-positive pair gaze down at the stream of miniature cars and people below as everyone’s fate hangs in the balance.
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Ania Hendryx WójtowiczDirectorFully Furnished (WIP)
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Ali KhechenSupervising Producer
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Yassmine HammoudiAssociate ProducerUnder the Lemon Tree (2019)
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Sebastián Betancur MontoyaCinematographerFata Morgana (2019 - audiovisual installation), Fully Furnished (2016 - producer)
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Séverin FavriauSound Design & MixingTitane (2021), And Then They Burn the Sea (2021), Virtual Voice (2021), Stranger (2020), La Belle Epoque (2019), and many more
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Amit ChowdhuryColor Grading
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Ania Hendryx WójtowiczProducerFata Morgana (2021), Stranger (2020), Emily ilaw ng tahanan (2020)
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Project Type:Documentary, Short
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Genres:Abstract Documentary, Creative Documentary, Short Documentary, Documentary
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Runtime:8 minutes 26 seconds
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Completion Date:October 21, 2021
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Production Budget:2,000 USD
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Country of Origin:Qatar
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Country of Filming:Qatar
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Language:English
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Shooting Format:iPhone & Huawei mobile phones
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Film Color:Color
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First-time Filmmaker:Yes
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Student Project:No
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Ajyal Film FestivalDoha
Qatar
November 9, 2021
Local Premiere
Official Selection -
Tribeca Film FestivalNew York
United States
June 8, 2022
International Premiere
Official Selection
Distribution Information
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Raina FilmsDistributorCountry: Worldwide
Ania Hendryx Wójtowicz is a Polish/American creative producer and artist whose work emphasizes cultural hybridity, blurring the lines between genres and exploring the intersections of film with other creative fields. She has produced video/multimedia performance installation artworks for the British Council exhibition 'The Place I Call Home' (2019), 'Qatar Foundation' (2018), 'Kuwait Pavilion at the Venice Biennale' (2016), and the 'Oslo Architecture Triennale' (2016). Since 2015, Ania has worked with the Doha Film Institute where she has played a key role in the production of nearly 40 short films and organizes the annual Qumra Shorts film industry programme. Prior to this, Ania worked for several years producing or directing cultural and commercial commissioned films in the Gulf region. Ania grew up between the U.S.A. and Poland, and holds a degree in Film & Media Studies / Latin American Studies from Washington University in St. Louis. She currently lives in Doha, Qatar with her Colombian spouse, who is an artist and the cinematographer of 'Fever Dream.'
Making this film has been a reflection on uncertainty, mortality, and grief, and an effort to connect over these difficult emotions as we process the effects of a years-long pandemic and start reconnecting with 'normal life.'
In late 2020, my team and I at Doha Film Institute were engaged in running our annual Documentary Lab led by the accomplished Cambodian filmmaker Rithy Panh. The coronavirus pandemic forced us to stay home, and we adapted to a virtual format. Very quickly, the lines between work and life became blurred. Halfway through the workshop, my husband and I contracted the virus. We were transported to a Qatar government isolation facility. The fact that it was a five-star hotel further confused our sense of reality. At first, we filmed things just to process the strange experience and to share it with our families. As we became accustomed to cohabitating with the virus, the quarantine hotel suite became my office and conversations with Rithy, my team, and the participating filmmakers encouraged us to turn our experience into a documentary. In this way, 'Fever Dream' became a de facto Doc Lab project—like much of 2020, unplanned and unexpected. It took me a long time to edit this film, most of 2021 in fact, and the process became an external dialogue between the difficult emotions that came up in the last two years as well as an exercise of processing and letting go.