Zaman, l'homme des roseaux

The documentarian Amer Alwan makes his fiction film debut with Zaman, L'Homme des Roseaux (Zaman, The Man From the Reeds), the first movie in 15 years to be filmed entirely in Iraq. Sami Kaftan stars as Zaman, an older gentleman who tends lovingly to his ill wife Najma (Shadha Salim) and shares his home with a boy (Hussein Imad) whose parents were killed during the Gulf War. A traveling doctor informs Zaman that other people than his wife are also suffering from the same unusual symptoms. Zaman sets off on a journey to locate medicines that may cure his wife. Once he locates the goods, however, he still must overcome the corruption and bureaucracy of modern Iraq. Screened at the 2003 San Sebastian Film Festival, the film was photographed on digital video, as Iraq had outlawed the importation of film stock.