EXPAT CINEMA: THE SWALLOWS OF KABUL
We continue with our series of Expat Cinema – where we offer the best foreign movies with English subtitles.
The Swallows Of Kabul is an aesthetically and narratively beautiful example of the affecting power of essential, humanist, and feminist ideas that auteur animation offers, and which can reach broader audiences of both adult and younger viewers.
Kabul under Taliban rule. Two neighborhoods and two couples. One conservative – Atiq and Mussarat have been married for 20 years and are deeply engrained in the traditions of Afghan life. Atiq works as the chief guard at the women’s prison. Mussarat is very ill and fights to remain a strong woman till the very end. One modern – young and in love, Zunaira and Mohsen are against all the same traditions. Under the Talibans, they’ve both lost their jobs as lawyer and university teacher and have difficulties to make ends meet. They have to sell their few possessions to buy food. Yet they’re determined to maintain their modern values. One day, a stoning. Then an act of humiliation. Then a fight… and life takes an irrevocable turn. When the lives of these diametrically opposite couples become intertwined, sacrifice becomes the price to pay for love.
