Khaaneh (The Silhouettes)

synopsis

At the height of the USSR’s invasion of Afghanistan in 1982, 1.5 million Afghans took a long journey to the border of Iran to flee war. Taghi, born after that generation, and unwilling to inherit the limitations of his parents’ refugee status, navigates outside the protective walls of his family to trace his identity and the doors to his future in the homeland he never knew. As war continues to rage in Afghanistan, what future awaits him in which land?

about the director

Afsaneh Salari

Afsaneh Salari is a documentary film director, editor, and producer who navigates these intersections from her dual bases in Paris and Tehran. She is the founding producer of the company Docmaniacs in Paris and the co-founder of the women’s film collective Docmaniacs in Tehran, which directs and produces films from Iran and Afghanistan. 

Afsaneh’s films as director and producer have been screened at festivals such as IDFA, Locarno, TIFF, Visions du Réel, CPH:DOX, Sheffield, Santa Barbara, DMZ, etc. They have received grants from the Sundance Film Institute, Doha Film Institute, and IDFA Bertha Fund, among others. She collaborates with the Ateliers Varan in Paris as an editing coach. Her latest film, “Great Are the Eyes of a Dead Father,” was produced in collaboration with the Wim Wenders Foundation.

Afsaneh has edited successful documentaries, among them ​​“Writing Hawa” by Najiba Noori, which won the Fipresci Award at IDFA 2024.