French-Malian director Fan Sissoko affirmed that her animated short film «Sundruð – Hold It Together» stemmed from her desire to express emotions that words cannot describe, noting that resorting to magical realism was a means that gives her the ability to embody internal conflicts and turn them into tangible visual images, bringing the film closer to the audience through a human language that transcends borders and cultures.

Fan Sissoko added, in an interview with Asharq Al-Awsat via Zoom, that animation gave her ample space to explore feelings of belonging and alienation in a way that traditional cinema cannot achieve, explaining that she always strives in her works to blur the boundaries between reality and imagination, because humans experience many of their emotions in a way that is difficult to express with words, while images and symbols can condense these feelings into impactful visual moments.

The film «Sundruð – Hold It Together» participated in the previous edition of the Annecy International Animated Film Festival, where it won the André Martin Award, one of the important awards dedicated to outstanding works in the field of animation. The film tells the story of Nima, a woman trying to adapt to a new society, but finds herself caught between a sense of belonging and a desire to escape, turning her psychological journey into a series of surreal transformations that reflect her internal struggle with identity, isolation, and the search for a place she can call home.

Film director Fan Sissoko (Production company)

Sissoko explained that she is naturally drawn to the style of magical realism, because it gives her an opportunity to explore the inner world of characters more honestly, noting that she likes to turn invisible emotions into material elements within the image, so that fear, loneliness, or anxiety become part of the world that the viewer sees, not just a feeling narrated through dialogue.

Lack of belonging

She pointed out that the feeling of alienation experienced by the film's protagonist, which appears linked to migration on the surface, is actually a human emotion that anyone can go through, stressing that what made her happiest after the film's first screenings was discovering that the audience interacted with this idea, as several viewers told her they found themselves inside Nima's character even though they had not experienced migration.

She added that the character Savana initially seems completely different from the protagonist; she is outgoing, confident, and acts as if she owns the place, but the unfolding events reveal that she too suffers from a deep sense of loneliness, noting that the film tries to prove in its ending that isolation can turn into a shared space that brings people together rather than separating them.

She indicated that the physical transformations the protagonist undergoes throughout the events were not merely visual gimmicks or fantasy effects, but rather a direct extension of her psychological state, explaining that she believes emotions leave a real mark on the body, and that language often fails to contain emotional complexities, so she resorts to visual metaphor as the closest language to expressing those states.

She touched on the impact of her personal experience on the film, stressing that the work carries a part of her life as a woman belonging to more than one culture, but she does not consider it autobiographical, noting that her stay in Iceland during the scriptwriting period had the greatest influence on the work's features; she drew inspiration from details of daily life there, from social customs at geothermal pools, to the way people communicate, to the weather and the nature of human relationships in Icelandic society.

Production collaboration

She affirmed that the production collaboration between Iceland, France, and Belgium gave the film exceptional richness, explaining that each country added a different element to the project: the development and musical composition took place in Iceland, while the animation was executed in France, and post-production was completed in Belgium, which allowed her to benefit from multiple expertise. Also, working with artists who had not lived in Iceland pushed her to rethink many details that seemed obvious to her and helped her highlight the most important aspects for the viewer.

The director presented her second experience in the field of animation (Production company)

Sissoko confirmed that the film relies on symbolic transformations that would be difficult to present with the same degree of freedom in live-action cinema, while animation allows the director to transcend the laws of reality and physics, turning fantasy into a natural part of the narrative, noting that geothermal pools hold a special place in Icelandic culture, so she chose them as the main stage for the events, as a microcosm of society with all its relationships and unwritten rules.

The director added that water itself carries deep human connotations for her: it symbolizes transformation, time, and constant change, and also has a dual nature; it can be frightening and violent in one moment, then turn into a source of tranquility and healing in another, which gives it great power for visual expression in cinema.

Fragmented sentences

She indicated that the lack of a common language between the film's characters was not just a dramatic detail, but a fundamental element in its structure, so she deliberately used fragmented sentences, misunderstandings, and silent moments, because they accurately reflect the feeling of a person when they find themselves in a society where they do not master the language or understand its rules.

She affirmed that what affected her most after the world premiere at the Annecy Festival was not the applause or critical acclaim, but the meetings she had with viewers after the screenings; she was surprised that many spoke to her about their personal sense of estrangement, which she considered proof that the film transcended the specificity of place to reach a shared human experience.

Screening of the film at the Annecy Festival recently in France (Production company)

Regarding the film winning the André Martin Award, she said this recognition came as a surprise to her, especially since she does not have an academic background in animation, and that Sundruð is only her second film in this field, pointing out that she completed the work while balancing family responsibilities and her daily job, so this appreciation is a great motivation for her to continue, and she hopes it will give the film a wider presence in Iceland, especially amid rising discussions about migration.

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