The Swallows of Kabul(2019)
dir. Zabou Breitman & Eléa Gobbé-Mévellec
Love and hope, under Taliban rule.
Where to watch: Streaming on KanopyLetterboxd ↗
In Taliban-ruled Kabul, 1998, two couples' lives collide after a young husband's reckless act of defiance sets off a chain of events neither family can escape. Adapted from Yasmina Khadra's novel, in delicate watercolor animation.
Why it’s here
Punk in its watercolor tenderness refusing to let brutality have the only voice — these are people living full inner lives under an occupation designed to erase them. Pedagogical in showing how authoritarian control over daily life — dress, music, movement — is the mechanism of the regime, not incidental to it.
Where This Film Lives
- Setting
- Afghanistan
Read Alongside
Books that share a topic, theme, or setting with this film.
A Thousand Splendid Suns
Khaled Hosseini
Two women. One house. Thirty years between them.
✦ READ – REFLECT → RESIST
The Breadwinner
Deborah Ellis
Taliban took her father. She became a boy to save her family.
✦ READ – REFLECT → RESIST
The Kite Runner
Khaled Hosseini
A betrayal. Thirty years of Afghan history. Redemption.
✦ READ – REFLECT → RESIST
The Swallows of Kabul
Yasmina Khadra
Taliban Kabul. Two families, one sky, lived apart.
✦ READ – REFLECT → RESIST
Good Girl
Aria Aber
Afghan German. Berlin clubs. She told them she was Greek.
✦ READ – REFLECT → RESIST
Songs of Love and War
Afghan Women's Writing Project
Afghan women writing against conditions of silence.
✦ READ – REFLECT → RESIST
The Wandering Falcon
Jamil Ahmad
Pakistan-Afghan borderlands in nine linked stories.
✦ READ – REFLECT → RESIST
A Year of Biblical Womanhood
Rachel Held Evans
She followed the rules. The rules lost.
✦ READ – REFLECT → RESIST