TEHRAN – The Route 66 Film Festival has selected a lineup of 16 Iranian shorts to screen in its 21st edition, which is currently underway in Springfield, the capital city of Illinois.

The festival will be running until November 14 entirely online. An in-person screening of award-winning films will be held on November 12.

The acclaimed animated movie “The Statue” by Mohsen Salehifard is one of the films.

The winner of the critics’ award at the 2022 Khamrubu International Short Film Festival in India follows a sculptor who engages with the clay of his sculpture and shapes it.

“World Cup” by Maryam Khodabakhsh will also be screened. On the night of a couple’s migration, the child of their friend who has been entrusted to them gets lost, and then a secret is revealed.

The lineup also includes “The Savior”. Directed by Soheila Purmohammadi, the film tells the story of a little girl who lives with her father in a village. After witnessing her mother's death, she tries to save the fish instead.

“Don’t Breathe”, a short fantasy that won the best film award at the 2022 Regina International Film Festival and Awards in Canada, is competing in the Route 66 festival.

In this film by Milad Nasimsobhan, the ruling power, in order to exert tyranny and increase oppression, has done something to its dissenters so that when they breathe they exhale smoke, and the agents must take such people into custody wherever they find them. Unaware of the law, a man meets one of the dissidents and it changes the course of his life, so he decides to immigrate with the dissident to a better land for a better life.

Among the films is “Cloudy Man” directed by Shahin Jalali. It is about an old key maker who begins to suffer from hand tremors. New reality brings painful consequences - the man finds it impossible to continue his career. The doctor advises him to retire, but the elder fears becoming useless and approaching death.

The lineup also features “Women on FEBA (Forward Edge of Battle Area), “Rain”, “Liberty”, “Pick”, “Middle Eastern Stories: Father”, “Silence Again”, “The Single Horn” (Unicorn), “Split Ends”, “Psycho” and “Painter”.

Photo: “The Statue” by Mohsen Salehifard.

MMS/YAW