Short Films

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Mined Zone

ZALAVA

• Director: Arsalan Amiri
• IRAN / 2021 / DCP / Colour / 93’ / Kurdish, Persian; Turkish, English s.t.

• Screenplay: Arsalan Amiri, Tahmineh Bahram, Ida Panahandeh
• Director of Photography: Mohammad Rasouli
• Editing: Emad Khodabaksh
• Music: Ramin Koush
• Cast: Navid Pourfaraj, Pouria Rahimi Sam, Hoda Zeinolabedin, Baset Rezaei, Shaho Rostami, Fereydoun Hamedi, Zahed Zandi, Saleh Rahimi
• Producer: Samira Baradari, Rouhollah Baradari
• Production Co.: Touba Films
• World Sales: LevelK

2021 Venice Grand Prix–Critics Week, FIPRESCI Prize
2021 Fajr Best Screenplay, Best First Film, Best Supporting Actor
2021 Fantastic Fest Austin Best Film (Next Wave)

Investigating reports of demonic possessions in a remote village, a military officer finds his beliefs tested by an enigmatic exorcist. Nestled among the mountains of north-western Iran, the village of Zalava is cursed by an ancient demon. Critically setting his film in 1978, at the onset of the Iranian Revolution, writer-director Arsalan Amiri conjures an eerie atmosphere accommodated by an allegorical setting of national politics. The story wrestles with paradoxes of faith, tradition, and modernity in the face of an ambiguous threat.

This film was a Meetings on the Bridge participant.