CINÉ-CASTELIERS

Adult audience, 13 years +

 

Ciné-Casteliers returns in its original format, presenting three short documentaries from Asia and the Middle East: 

• Noon, le pain de Téhéran (Iran/France), a coming-of-age film about exile
• A Bird in Passage (India), a documentary about puppeteer Puran Bat
• Everything that is (Palestine), a documentary about life as an artist in wartime

 

Take a seat and enjoy!

 

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Languages:  French, Persian, Hindi, with French and English subtitles

Running time: 60 minutes

Technique: Documentary

 

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SYNOPSIS AND FILMMAKERS

 

Noon, le pain de Téhéran, by Roshanak Roshan (France, Iran, 2024)
20 min., in French and Persian, with French and English subtitles

This is the story of Shirin, an Iranian woman who is now a French citizen, as she recounts her childhood memories in Iran through four significant events: the revolution, the war, modernisation and the embargo. This story is also a long journey that takes us through different types of bread, different eras and different places, but it is also a more intimate journey into Shirin’s inner world and emotions.

 

A Bird in Passage, by Manish Ram Sachdeva (India, 2019)
10 min. 45 sec., in Hindi, with English subtitles

A Bird in Passage is a short documentary film about the life and the art of Shri Puran Bhat, a traditional puppeteer from India. Originally from the state of Rajasthan, his group of puppeteer families settled in Delhi in the 1950s. They lived in the Kathputli Colony, a street artist community. At its peak, the colony was home to over 3,500 families. Kathputli is the Hindi language word for puppet. In 2014, the colony was demolished as part of a government “urban rehabilitation” project and the artists were displaced. But now he doesn’t have a roof over his head, and his community of artists is struggling to ensure its existence. In 2003, Puran Bhat was awarded the Sangeet Natak Akademi Award— the highest distinction presented to a practising Indian artist.

Manish Ram Sachdeva is a Delhi-based puppeteer and filmmaker and Artistic Director at The Puppet Studio India. He trained in Muppet-style video puppetry with American master Martin. P. Robinson, the main instructor for Sesame Street International. He also trained under renowned puppeteers Noel McNeal (Bear in the Big Blue House, USA) and Nyanga Tshabalala (Takalani Sesame, South Africa). He plays the characters and voices of Boombah, Khadoosa, Cookie Monster, Zeerak, Tarram the frog, as well as an array of other characters for Galli Galli Sim Sim, the Hindi-language adaptation of Sesame Street. 

 

Everything that is, by Henry Plavidal (Palestine, 2025)
20 min., in English and Arabic, with French subtitles

Mahdi Karira, one of the last puppet artists still working in Gaza, transforms the ruins of war into living figures and performs his shows in camps for displaced persons, offering moments of joy in amidst the ongoing genocide. Living in a tent with his family, he shares his artistic practice and his reflections on art, displacement and survival.

Through images captured in Gaza and previously unpublished poems by Jawad Al-Aqqad, the film bears witness to the creative resistance of a generation of Palestinian artists, beyond the dominant narratives of suffering and displacement.

Henry Plavidal has been working in Israel and Palestine for over 20 years, including 10 years in Gaza, and has established strong ties with local civil society. Through film, he documents everyday life in the region. He has produced more than a dozen investigative films with Forensic Architecture, and has collaborated as a researcher on Laura Poitras’ Terror Contagion (2021), which was screened at the Cannes Film Festival and shortlisted for an Oscar.