NNarrative CompetitionOriginal Title: Bîranînêm li ser kevirî
Director: Shawkat Amin Korki
Iraq, Germany, Qatar | Kurdish, Arabic, Farsi
2014 | 97min.
Subtitles: Arabic, English
Format: DCP
Theme: V
15+After the fall of the regime in Iraq, childhood friends Hussein and Alan decide to produce a film about the Al Anfal Kurdish genocide. But making a film in postwar Kurdistan is a nightmarish experience, the most difficult task being to find a lead actress. Problems emerge one after the other, and they are on the verge of giving up when a young lady, Sinor, arrives at the audition. She is young, beautiful and above all passionate about the project. Her own childhood is deeply affected by the Al Anfal campaign. The joy of finding the perfect leading lady for the film, alas, is short lived, as Sinor needs the permission of her guardian Uncle Hamid and her cousin Hiwa to be in the film, but honuorable families do not send their daughters to act in films! Hussein and Alan are constantly running out of time, money, energy and patience. As he has amply demonstrated in his previous features Crossing the Dust (2006) and Kick Off (2009), Shawkat is intrinsically preoccupied by the sociocultural and political realities of contemporary Kurds. Through the trials and tribulations of his protagonists, which he treats with a subtle humour, Shawkat gives us a poignant glimpse of contemporary Kurdish society as well as its past in this film which may have been inspired by his personal experiences as a filmmaker. —Raman Chawla