GRASSHOPPERS
Hanis Bagashov
North Macedonia / France
Nora, a mute girl, escapes the family gathering to meet her secret admirer Amir, and make love for the first time.
SYNOPSIS
19-year-old Nora, distant and unable to speak, shares mutual tenderness with Amir, a lonely but wild 14-year-old boy - a grasshopper hunter.
During her sister’s birthday, Nora feels pressured by the family and sneaks out to meet Amir. On their brief encounter in nature, they make love for the first time.
Her family raise the alarm when they become aware of Nora’s absence, while Nora and Amir go through an awkward feeling of transition between late childhood and the undiscovered world of adulthood.
INTENTION
Grasshoppers is a story about forbidden love, and the questions of estrangement and interpretation.
As a kid, I used to spend my time in the remote village of my grandparents. One summer while I was there, my next door neighbor, a girl with a slightly abnormal behavior, was seeing a younger boy from the village. Her family made a scandal out of this, mainly because they did not see her “fit”, or mentally capable to be dating.
Nora and Amir’s meeting is tender, meaningful and dreamy, but is violated by the interpretation from the others, who project their prejudices and ideas upon it. Because of her “disability”, she is denied the possibility of having a lover. One’s desire is like water making its way through rocks, even though it often shows that we only fall in love with the attention we receive, and the way others see us. The action is set in the course of one day, when Nora and the other characters act in a space around which a fog is forming, and grasshoppers are transmitting certain signals to guide her and our view.
DIRECTOR
Hanis Bagashov
Hanis Bagashov is a LIM - Less is More, Berlinale and Sarajevo Talents alumnus. His short Mishko was selected at Sarajevo FF 2018. He played one of the leading roles in the feature When the Day Had No Name by Teona Strugar Mitevska (Berlinale 2017).
PRODUCER
Jérôme Blesson
Jérôme Blesson is a founder of La Belle Affaire Productions, based in Montpellier and Paris. Jérôme notably produced the feature Alva by Ico Costa (Rotterdam IFF 2019), Le Pays by Lucien Monot (Vision du Réel 2019), and recently L’Agneau de Dieu by David Pinheiro Vicente (Cannes Official Competition2020).
PRODUCER
Ilija Tiricovski
Ilija Tiricovski is a producer based in Skopje. He has been part of OXO team for 12 years with experience in shorts, features, TV series.
Genre
Drama
Length
15 min
Language
Albanian
Shooting location
North Macedonia
Production companies
La Belle Affaire Productions (France),
OXO Production (North Macedonia)
Estimated budget
€55.000
Looking for
Coproducers, Sales,
Distribution