EXCLUSIVE: Rome-based sales company True Colours has boarded Norwegian-Kurdish director Halkawt Mustafa’s drama No Paradise If You Are Killed by a Woman ahead of its world premiere Out of Competition at the Venice Film Festival in September.
Avan Jamal stars as a female Peshmerga sniper who heads to Mosul to rescue her younger sister from ISIS, forcing her to confront the violence she survived and the shadows of the person she has become. The cast also features Thorbjørn Harr, Kanar Sarchl and Kader Jalal.
Mustafa wrote, directed and produced the film, which is inspired by years of conversations with real Kurdish women who fought ISIS.
It follows his documentary Hiding Saddam Hussein, taking its cue from the farmer who hid the Iraqi dictator for 235 days in 2003, and Iraq’s 2016 Oscar submission The Classic.
The director previously explored the world of female Kurdish fighters with the 2015 documentary The Women ISIS Fears.
“We are very happy to collaborate with True Colours on the film’s international journey. From our first conversations, the team understood both the film’s artistic vision and its universal message,” said Mustafa.
The film is produced by Mustafa, Janne Hjeltnes and John M. Jacobsen for Hene Films, in co-production with The Chimney Pot (Sweden) and La Media (Iraq).
“We are thrilled to be working on Halkawt’s film. An immensely engaging cinematic experience, it powerfully portrays the Kurdish people’s struggle through the eyes of a heroic female fighter,” said Fabio Tucci, Head of Acquisitions at True Colours.
