Diagonale Prize Short Feature ’24

Diagonale Prize for Best Short Feature Film

Sallar Othman
Yarê

Jury statement: With the Diagonale Award for the best short fiction film, we are honouring a work that opens up a world in less than 20 minutes and has made an enormous impression on us viewers with its unadorned staging and clarity: The view of the scarcity of water as a resource, the attempt to avoid any exertion so as not to exhaust oneself, to keep one’s own strength together is reflected in the reduction of the film’s narrative means. There is no such thing as too much. You can hear the screw caps of empty water bottles, plastic canisters, the rolling of a water barrel over sandy fields. The constantly unanswered question of “When will there be water?” drives the plot forward, pushing the titular protagonist to defy her mother’s rules and embark on a heroine’s journey that ends in a dry ditch. We, who see the horizon, no longer see Yarê, only hear her cursing. And stay with her.

Jury short feature film:
Natascha Gangl (writer, AT)
Mo Harawe (director, AT)
Florian Widegger (curator, AT)