Film Archive

The Exam

Crystal Globe Competition 2021 / Ezmûn / Germany, Iraqi Kurdistan, Qatar 2021

If Rojin doesn’t pass the university entrance exam, she will have to go through with an arranged marriage. If she does get in, she will be free. This is the pronouncement of her father, the head of the family. Rojin’s older sister Shilan tries to help her as best she can, yet every well-meant action draws the young woman deeper into a web of deceit and lies. An absorbing drama and daring probe into the theme of a woman’s right to her own life.

Synopsis

If Rojin doesn’t pass the university entrance exam, she will have to go through with an arranged marriage. If she does get in, she will be free. For Rojin’s older sister Shilan, who is suffering at the hands of a despotic husband, the idea that she might not get through is inconceivable, so she makes every effort to ensure Rojin succeeds. There is no way she will allow her sister to meet the same fate as her. Yet every well-meant action just brings further problems… Set in war-torn Iraqi Kurdistan, Shawkat Amin Korki’s drama boldly examines a theme deliberately ignored in Middle Eastern cinema – the subject of women’s rights: their entitlement not only to education, but also to make decisions about their own lives.

Anna Kořínek

About the film

89 min / Color, DCP
World premiere
Director Shawkat Amin Korki / Screenplay Shawkat Amin Korki, Mohamed Reza Gohari / Dir. of Photography Adib Sobhani / Music Mehmûd Berazî / Editor Ebraim Saeedi / Art Director Jalal Saed Panah / Producer Mehmet Aktaş / Production mîtosfilm / Coproduction Masti Films / Cast Avan Jamal, Vania Salar, Hussein Hassan, Hoshyar Nerwayi, Kawa Kadir, Shwan Attoof / Sales ArtHood Entertainment GmbH / Contact Alexander Masche

About the director

Shawkat Amin Korki (1973, Zakho, Iraqi Kurdistan). Filmography: Crossing the Dust (Parinawa la ghobar, 2006), Kick Off (2009), Memories on Stone (Bîranînen li ser kevirî, 2014), The Exam (Ezmûn, 2021).