A short film, which tells the story of a four-year-old Armenian girl secretly traveling across the border to Turkey in her uncle’s luggage, has won the special jury prize at the South-East European Film Festival in Paris.

The film, titled “Ziazan” (“Rainbow,” in Armenia), is acclaimed Turkish actress Derya Durmaz’s directorial debut.
‘“Ziazan’ takes a delicate political issue and subverts it into a bright story, a 15-minute journey told through the eyes of a 4-year-old girl,” Hürriyet Daily News reported.

It also noted that, “The political issue is the closed land border between Turkey and Armenia, and the repercussions of it through the informal luggage trade between the two countries.”

Durmaz remembers reading a story about three years ago on the informal luggage trade between Armenia and Turkey.
Subsequently, she had attended a workshop by the Armenia-Turkey Cinema Platform, and which was held in Armenia’s capital city Yerevan.

“The workshop in Yerevan both helped me see beyond the border and contributed a great deal to my film,” said Durmaz.