Boris Hadzija, Hoda Taheri
Locarno Residency 2023 | Serbia, Iran
Locarno Residency 2023 | Serbia, Iran
Hoda Taheri, born in Tehran in 1992, is an Iranian refugee artist and filmmaker based in Berlin, Germany. In 2016, she got her bachelor's degree in visual communication from Limkokwing University in Malaysia. Her short film Mother Prays All Day Long won the Special Mention at Locarno Film Festival 2022, was nominated for the German Short Film Award and won the best short film in the national competition at Dresden Filmfest.
Boris Hadžija is a Serbian filmmaker and musician based in Berlin. After gaining a master’s degree in classical piano he studied film directing at DFFB. He produced the film Mother Prays All Day Long, which premiered at the Locarno Film Festival 2022 and wrote and directed Yugotransport, premiered at the IFFR 2023. He was nominated for the German Short Film Award and his films aired on arte and rbb. He is a recipient of a scholarship awarded by DAAD.
Hoda Taheri
2022 Mother Prays All Day Long
2023 As if Mother Cried That Night
Boris Hadzija
2020 Back to the west
2021 A Simple Event
2023 Yugotransport
Production: Luise Hauschild (New Matter Films)
As the women's protests in Iran escalate, Hoda, an Iranian refugee in Germany, and her sister Hosna living in Tehran, grow closer despite years of separation. When Hosna is forced to flee after participating in demonstrations, Hoda helps plan her escape based on her own asylum experience. Through this, the bond between the sisters, who find themselves on opposite sides of the fence - one in Iran leaving her family and the other starting a new one in Germany with her male homosexual partner Boris - will bring out questions regarding family structures, issues around bureaucracy and heteronormativity. As Hosna arrives in Germany, the question remains: can the physical reunion heal their broken bond?
Family as a construct and way of living that each society, western or non-western, dictates to the individual is the central question in this film. By casting ourselves and real-life characters, we attempt to give a greater sense of depth to the film, in which every moment has been driven by our real-life events and relieved with more consciousness and reflection. The families we grew up in, the present situation we live and the future we try to build, meet at a crossroad.