For Iraqis who lived through the 1990s, dictator Saddam Hussein’s birthday on April 28 was a disorientating day of celebration and propaganda.

Parties were staged across the sanctions-hit country to mark the occasion, while many public squares and bridges around Baghdad were decorated with coloured lights.

State radio played endless songs to the glory of the ruthless national leader and callers were asked to recount improvised poems in his honour.

In schools, children would be tasked with baking cakes for “Mr. President” — the inspiration for a new film by 37-year-old Iraqi director Hasan Hadi which is making waves internationally.

“We had strategies to avoid being picked such as going to the bathroom during the draw, calling in sick, or trying to bribe the teacher,” Hadi told AFP in an interview in Paris.

“The President’s Cake” is his first feature-length film, which picked up a top award at the Cannes Film Festival last year and has gone on earn a wide international release.

Hadi also won over American producer Chris Columbus, whose past credits include “Gremlins” and “Harry Potter”, who fell in love with the movie and signed on as an executive producer. The story follows nine-year-old Lamia who must brave the dangers of gathering the precious ingredients needed to bake a cake for Saddam and escape punishment for failing.

At the time, Iraq was under crippling UN sanctions after Saddam’s invasion of Kuwait in 1990, putting eggs, flour and sugar beyond the reach of many ordinary Iraqis.

Lamia and her grandmother can barely afford to eat themselves but the pair set off from their home in the marshlands in southern Iraq to try to track down the unaffordable ingredients.

Tragic ‘randomness’

Hadi drew on his own memories of a country that lacked everything but was required to celebrate each of the dictator’s birthdays.

“This was one of the many contradictions you had to live with,” added Hadi, who only tasted a full-fat cake as a teenager, having grown up eating date-based ones.

He always managed to escape the school baking task but he remembered the tragic fate of one of his classmates who failed to prepare a cake in time.

He was expelled from school, then conscripted into the Iraqi army as a child before dying a few years later.

“The randomness and the silliness of something as stupid as failing to bake a cake could change your destiny and fate forever,” added Hadi, who grew up watching banned films on smuggled VHS cassettes.

“Dictatorship not only destroys freedom of speech, it destroys the elements that make you a straight human,” Hadi explained. “It makes you lie, it makes you a hypocrite, it makes you deceitful and it lasts long after it’s gone.”

Saddam himself would usually appear on state TV on the evening of his birthday, often wearing a white suit, to enjoy an extravagant and lavishly decorated cake that defied the national shortages.

With “The President’s Cake”, Hadi hopes to deliver a timely reminder to his country, where Saddam’s rule “hasn’t been explored enough”.

The Hollywood Reporter has called it a “tragicomic gem”, while Variety said it was “a compassionate and winsome debut”.

Once a thriving producer of films, Iraqi cinema is still struggling to recover from the chaos the country has endured over the last two decades.

Only around 40 cinemas are estimated to still exist.

“I hope people will be more receptive to Iraqi films in coming years,” said Hadi.

Hadi dedicated his Camera d’Or award, which honours first-time directors, to “every kid or child around the world who somehow finds love, friendship and joy amid war, sanctions and dictatorship.

“You are the real heroes,” he said.

He later shared the stage with dissident Iranian filmmaker Jafar Panahi, who won the festival’s Palme D’Or top prize for his “It Was Just an Accident”, the tale of five ordinary Iranians confronting a man they believed tortured them in jail.

“The President’s Cake” has received excellent reviews since premiering last week in the Directors’ Fortnight section. Cinema bible ‘Variety’ called it a “tragicomic gem”.

‘Deadline’ said it was “head and shoulders above” some of the films in the running for the festival’s Palme d’Or top prize, and “could turn out to be Iraq’s first nominee for an Oscar”.

Also from the Middle East, Palestinian director Tawfeek Barhom received his award for his short film “I’m Glad You’re Dead Now”.

After giving thanks, he took the opportunity to mention the war in Gaza.

“In 20 years from now when we are visiting the Gaza Strip, try not to think about the dead and have a nice trip,” he said.

Sri Lankan director Lalith Rathnayake’s “Riverstone”, about one man’s mountain road trip to his kangaroo court execution, won the top prize Tuesday at France’s Vesoul International Film Festival of Asian Cinema.

The feature, one of nine fiction films competing for the Cyclo d’Or prize, also scooped two gongs at the Shanghai Film Festival last June.

The jury, chaired by Chinese documentary maker Wang Bing, praised the film for its “concise and powerful narrative, revealing the serious crisis that political power in Asia poses to the survival of ordinary people. It reflects the current situation on the continent”.

Among the other films to score honours, “Kurak”, a Kyrgyz production about violence against women, date rape drugs and the influence of the ruling elite, won the Grand Jury Award.

The Audience Award went to the Indian film “Full Plate”, which deals with the complicated relationship between the country’s Hindus and Muslims.

“Riverstone” is the second Sri Lankan film to take the top prize at the French festival, after Aruna Jayawardana’s “August Drizzle” in 2012.

More than 100 films from 24 countries were presented over the week, drawing thousands of spectators.

The Vesoul International Film Festival of Asian Cinema (French: Festival international des cinémas d’Asie) is an annual special-interest film festival focusing on the cinemas of Asia. The festival is held annually in Vesoul, France. It was created in 1995 by Martine and Jean-Marc Thérouanne who have been codirecting the festival since then.

The highest award of the festival is the Golden Cyclo Award. Other awards include the Special Langues “O” Award, given by the French National Institute for Oriental Languages and Civilizations and the Emile Guimet Award by the Friends Association of National Museum of Asian Arts-Guimet at the festival.

Netflix is officially ending support for the PlayStation 3, marking the end of an era for one of the longest-running streaming apps on a gaming console.

The Netflix app will stop functioning on the PS3 starting March 2, 2026, requiring users to switch to newer devices to continue streaming movies and TV shows.

Users launching the app are now seeing a notification that reads, “Unfortunately, Netflix will no longer be available on this device after March 2, 2026,” along with a link directing viewers to a list of supported devices. While Netflix’s compatibility page has yet to reflect the change, widespread user reports suggest the shutdown is imminent.

Although the PlayStation 3 is approaching two decades since its release, it has continued to support major streaming platforms such as YouTube, Prime Video, and Netflix. However, the decision appears tied to the console’s aging hardware. According to Netflix’s Help Center, support may end when devices can no longer receive updates or support newer features required for a “consistent, high-quality, and secure” viewing experience.

The move has disappointed some longtime users, particularly those who relied on the PS3 to stream content on older televisions, including CRT models that benefit from the console’s composite connections. Others noted that the device provided a convenient way to maintain older account-sharing setups.

Netflix first arrived on the PS3 in 2009, initially requiring a physical streaming disc before launching a disc-free app in 2010. Its retirement in 2026 gives the service an impressive 16-year lifespan on the console.

While Netflix is phasing out legacy device support, the PS3 remains relevant for gaming enthusiasts, continuing to offer access to a vast library of classic titles even as streaming capabilities fade.

Netflix was founded by Marc Randolph and Reed Hastings on August 29, 1997, in Scotts Valley, California. Hastings, a computer scientist and mathematician, was a co-founder of Pure Software, which was acquired by Rational Software that year for $750 million, the then-biggest acquisition in Silicon Valley history. Randolph had worked as a marketing director for Pure Software after Pure Atria acquired a company where Randolph worked. He was previously a co-founder of MicroWarehouse, a computer mail-order company, as well as vice president of marketing for Borland.

Hastings and Randolph had come up with the idea for Netflix while carpooling between their homes in Santa Cruz, California, and Pure Atria’s headquarters in Sunnyvale.