Directed by Daniel Asadi Faezi and Mila Zhluktenko • 2022 • Uzbekistan

The fate of the Aral Sea, which spans the Uzbek-Kazakh border, is one of the twentieth century’s greatest environmental disasters. Ravaged by Soviet industrial policy, this once abundant inland ocean has long since become the arid “Aralkum” – or Aral desert. Daniel Asadi Faezi and Mila Zhluktenko’s reflective account of this desolation juxtaposes archival film of old fishing villages, taxidermied animals long since extinct in the region, and present-day footage of the saxaul bushes and rotting shipwrecks that now define the landscape. A moving but disturbing reckoning with recent history and film’s role in preserving the past.

ARALKUM • АРАЛКУМ
Written and directed by Daniel Asadi Faezi and Mila Zhluktenko
Cinematography by Sadriddin Shakhabiddinov
Music by Giovanni Berg
Featuring: Uralbay Utegenov

In Uzbek and Karakalpak with English subtitles