Overview
- Writer-director Hasan Hadi draws on his own childhood in southern Iraq under international sanctions to shape the story.
- Iraq has submitted the film as its entry for this year’s International Feature Oscar.
- The debut earned Cannes’ Camera d’Or and an audience prize, marking a first for an Iraqi filmmaker.
- The plot follows nine-year-old Lamia, chosen to bake a birthday cake for Saddam Hussein, as she searches for scarce ingredients with her friend Saeed and a rooster.
- Hadi cast non-professional locals and incorporates culturally rooted details such as the rooster, and early reactions in Iraq have been warm after years of dormant cinema venues.