Twelve is a fully immersive sonic journey that challenges the traditional role of image in storytelling. This sound-only film reimagines cinema through immersive audio techniques that replace visuals with vivid mental imagery, allowing the audience to “see” with their ears. By eliminating the screen, the experience places the listener at the heart of the scene, breaking the boundaries of conventional film.

Throughout the experience, the audience is transported alongside the film’s protagonist—someone grappling with a crisis of their own making, a decision that could bring about the end of the world as we know it.

Hadil Ali is a filmmaker, film studies researcher, and educator currently based between Cairo and Barcelona. She is a researcher at the Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona (UAB) and a teaching assistant at the Arab Academy for Science, Technology, and Maritime Transport (AAST) in Cairo. Her work lies at the intersection of film theory and practice, with a particular focus on exploring non-traditional narrative forms.

Her practice is informed by experimental cinema traditions and contemporary debates on sensory perception and narrative form. Through a multidisciplinary approach—drawing from her experience in directing, editing, and cinematography within the independent film scene. She investigates how immersive sound can function not merely as a support to visuals, but as a primary narrative architecture in film.

In this event, Hadil presents a sound-only narrative experiment utilizing 7.1 surround and Dolby Atomos techniques. Acting as director, scriptwriter, and sound designer, she reimagines cinematic storytelling through audio alone, proposing an alternative film genre grounded in immersive sonic experience.

This project is part of a larger inquiry into immersive audio as cinematic form, with future iterations planned for installation and live performance contexts.

What to expect? We invite you to reflect on your personal definition of cinema. Ask yourself: What is film? How powerful is the image in cinema? Throughout this event, your understanding will be challenged and expanded. After the experience, we’re eager to know—will you still hold the same view of film? To continue the conversation, a short survey will be available just outside the event area. Your responses will help in creating a wider understanding to what cinema is and what it can be.