Image+Nation
WE ARE FAHEEM + KARUM

WE ARE FAHEEM + KARUM

ONIR (ANIRBAN) DHAR | INDIA | 2025 | 81 MIN | KASHMIRI EST

ONIR (ANIRBAN) DHAR | INDIA | 2025 | 81 MIN | KASHMIRI EST

Feature ZEITGEIST COMPETITIONFIRST VOICES

Synopsis

Karun, a kindly border guard, finds himself in “paradise” among Bandipora’s soaring peaks, though religious and cultural resentments simmer and scald. Jolted by Faheem’s gorgeous face revealed from behind a helmet visor, Karun is drawn into a romance with indelible repercussions in this first queer film in the Kashmiri language. Wooed by an apple and a warm ripple of attraction each time Faheem (a subtle yet potent Mir Tawseef) passes his checkpoint, Karun (Akash Unnimenon) ventures into Gurez to seek out further encounters. Gurez, a remote Kashmiri village near the border between India and Pakistan, speaks with the voice of soft lullabies and bleating sheep, of a flowing river indifferent to divisions, though that tranquility is soon replaced by distant gunfire. Determined to drop the veil of shame that partitions their lives, Faheem and Karun’s restless hearts pine for one another from a distance, the two praying to separate deities but sharing an equal desire. Wanting, so passionately, to be one. When terrorist infiltrators and a homegrown street gang make a volatile situation worse, can love bind as society breaks?

Trailer

Filmmaker Bio

Onir is an Indian filmmaker, producer, screenwriter and editor born in Bhutan. He is best known for his film My Brother Nikhil (Audience Award, I+N18, 2005), based on the life of Dominic D'Souza that was one of the first mainstream Hindi films dealing with AIDS and same-sex relationships. In 2011, he won the Indian National Film Award for Best Film for the anthology, I AM—a film considered one of the first and largest crowd-funded/ crowd-sourced films in India—dealing with single motherhood, child sexual abuse, displacement and LGBTQ+ rights. In 2024, Onir’s Pine Cone, a queer love story based on Onir’s memoir I Am Onir and I Am Gay screened at BFI Flare. Onir’s We Are Faheem + Karun had its international premiere at BFI Flare in March 2025.

Producer

Onir (Anirban) Dhar

Writer

Onir (Anirban) Dhar, Fawzia Mirza

Cinematographer

Ramananda Sarkar

Cast

  • Akash Unimenon
  • Mir Tawseef
  • Mir Salman
  • Sana Javeid
  • Bashir Lone
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