Can you leave the door open?

2023, video, 3m43

Ava is a child with a limitless imagination. She is a city kid who loves to play in her bedroom and letting herself get carried by her vivid dreams. Sometimes her dreamy fantasies find a way out of her porous bedroom walls and she finds herself riding on her mini motorcycle on infinite highway tunnels. Sometimes, reality finds its way back into her bedroom bringing her into dangerous situations.

How thick can the child’s bedroom walls be? The films points at the boundaries and ambiguous limits of the child’s imaginary when facing violence.

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CREDITS:

Written, directed, produced, edited, set, color grading: Maïa Taïeb

Cast: Lou Elie Dit Cosaque (main character), Mihali Pavlopoulos and Shai Dakauter (playing thugs)

DOP: Mostafa Heravi

Gaffer: Abel Andel

Clothes: Rémy Guerra

Music: Elia Taïeb

Help with set building: Maya Tricoire, Astrid Ardagh, Logan Muamba, Paula Megija Kārklina

Help on set: Surim Kim

With objects from Clara Rojas (glass cups) and Mariana Charrua & Iiris Riihimaki (wooden curtains)

Infinite thanks to Nirit Peled, Margarita Kosareva, Jean Pierre Taïeb, Gideon Van Der Stelt, and the whole Grootenboer family.

Filmed at Tungsten Studio, Gerrit Rietveld Academie VAV- moving image