When a teenage girl in the remote wilderness of Kurdistan loses her mother, she finds herself all alone in the world with only her grieving father as all that she has in the world. The father-daughter duo starts life all over again, going through their daily chores and trying to adapt to the new situation in their life. They realize that they have only each other to live for and slowly try to bring the semblance of normalcy back to their existence. As life seems to find its rhythm with the two, the father discovers a secret that unsettles him. He begins to question his whole life, his deceased wife and even his relationship with his daughter. The conflict builds in his mind provoking him to the unthinkable. Does the father’s relationship with his daughter change because of his conflict? Will he take the right decision and make the correct choice?
‘The Other’ is a narrative short by director duo Ako Zandkarimi and Saman Hosseinpour. The project is a joint Indo-Iranian venture by producers Ravinder Dhaka, Dimen Zandi, Ako Zandkarimi and Saman Hosseinpour. The film tells of a nuclear family in remote Kurdistan at just the very leisurely pace that life seems to take on in the quiet countryside. A silent film, ‘The Other’ does away with dialogues as the story it tells is universal and needs no language. ‘The Other is the first silent Indo-Iranian film in the history of cinema. The stark visuals of the punishing landscape that depicts the loneliness of the characters and the haunting music reminiscent of the chill in the air, more than makes up for the absence of the spoken word. The unintrusive camera work and artful storytelling bring to life the quiet life of the countryside that provides the setting for the story.
The film explores the true foundations on which love and relationships are built on. Can a sliver of doubt form a crack that over time develops fractures in relationships? When the father, a professional who dyes yarn for a living, decides to dye his daughter’s hair, is it an effort to wash away his past with a new colour or is he trying to change the very colours of his life?
