Land of Jerry Cans, The Italy
2009, 30min.
Producers: Paola Piacenza, Gabriella Manfre, Nicola Zappa, Director: Paola Piacenza, Script: Paola Piacenza, Stefano Copelli, Director of Photography: Paola Piacenza, Sound: Paola Piacenza, Editor: Mattia Matteucci
A documentary on the Iran-Iraq border, its tragic past and its paradoxical present. Told through the voices of the people of three villages, Penjwen, Biyara and Tawela, in the Iraqi Kurdistan, located a few meters from the Iranian border. The film’s two main characters are: Alias, the secretary of the Communist Party in Tawela, whose life exemplifies the absurdity of the place – dispossessed of his properties by the Baath Party, arrested because of his political affiliation, exiled during the Iran-Iraq war, refugee during the 1991 intifada: his brother joined the Peshmerga resistance and was killed on the battleground. And his old mother, an eyewitness of the the past and present of the border. Alias is now a smuggler, as are all the residents of the area. What the Iraqis have to smuggle «while the entire world fights for our oil», is fuel. The third producer of oil in the Middle East has to smuggle oil from its historical enemy, Iran.
Awards
Ucca-20 citta Award (Festival dei popoli, Florence, 2009)
Production Company
Invisible Film
Via Pietro Crespi 6
20127 Milano, Italy | Piacenza, PaolaPaola Piacenza
Journalist since 1990, currently working for the weekly magazine of the Italian newspaper Corriere della Sera, Paola Piacenza is a film critic and a reporter. She has been working in Lebanon, Egypt, Israel and Palestine, among other places. The Land of Jerry Cans is her first documentary. It has been presented at The New York Independent Film and Video Festival, at the Festival dei Popoli in Florence, at Filmmaker in Milano, Sguardi Altrove in Milano, Visioni Italiane in Bologna, and at LIDF )London International Documentary Festival). She is working on a new film on borders.
Filmography
The Land of Jerry Cans (2009) |
