MONTREAL WORLD FILM FESTIVAL, August 31, 2016 – “House Without
Roof”, set in Iraqi Kurdistan and Germany, is a deeply felt and moving story of
three siblings who journey to Kurdistan to fulfill their mother’s last wish to
be buried next to their father.
The film
opens with a clip of Jan, Alan and Liya as children cavorting during a photo
shoot with their parents. The happiness and joy of that time quickly fades as
the story picks up in present day Germany with the mother’s controversial
decision to return to Kurdistan.
That
decision comes as a surprise to Alan and Liya, but not to the elder Jan, who
knew about it but did not tell his siblings. This creates a rift among the
three, but the sudden death of their mother forces them to come together again
and to honor her last request.
But the rift
among the siblings only grows as more family secrets are revealed about their
father’s past during the regime of Saddam Hussein, a past that bitterly divides
the extended family.
The
siblings’ journey to bury their mother next to their father runs a gamut of
emotions, from anger and division to reconciliation and love. The three
principal actors – Mina Ozlem Sagdic, Sasun Sayan and Murat Seven – are superb
in their roles as the siblings as is the supporting cast.
The film was
written and directed by Soleen Yusef, who was born in Duhok in Iraqi Kurdistan.
According to the website Filmfest Munchen, Yusef’s family fled to Germany when
she was nine years old. She trained as a singer and actress in Berlin – in the
film Liya is a singer in a German night club – and enrolled at Filmakademie Baden-Württemberg in the dramatic
directing department. “House Without Roof” is her graduating film.
“House Without Roof” won the Best
Production award at Filmfest Munchen earlier this year.
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