A Time for Drunken Horses

A Kurdish village on Iran's border with Iraq. Their father steps on a mine at the border and dies. Five children are left. The eldest, Ayoub, is twelve and has to take on the family's living. His brother Madi is ill; he does not grow, is constantly on medication, and will not live without an operation. The operation needs money and there is no money in the village. Ayoub joins the mule teams smuggling across the border. The snow is deep and the animals freeze, so they give the mules drink. There are mines along the way and there are patrols. Bahman Ghobadi writes and directs. Ayoub Ahmadi, Rojin Younessi and Madi Ekhtiar-dini are in the cast. It is an Iranian production and the language is Kurdish. The film shared the Caméra d'Or at the Cannes Film Festival. It is cited as one of the first features shot in Kurdish in Iran. There are no professional actors in the cast; all are people living in the region and some play their own situations. The matter it treats is responsibility; a child does adult work and the film does not offer it as heroism. The snow, the mules and the walking were shot in real conditions and set the rhythm. It runs short and the narrative explains nothing anywhere. Its limit is the watching; the conditions are extremely hard and the narrative gives no resolution. Who it is for: viewers who like Iranian and Kurdish cinema and realist drama. Who it is not for: the subject is heavy, the ending open, and there is no hope.