On the Way

Samir Karahoda felt compelled to make his new short On the Way after a real conversation with his son.

The dialogue is recreated in the film, for which Karahoda’s son Miron is both performer and credited co-writer. Sat in a car next to his father (played by Ylber Mehmeti), Miron gives voice to his frustration, even as an adolescent early-teen, about the lack of a future he sees in his own country of Kosovo. Karahoda takes this single conversation and re-contextualises it to form a thoughtful meditation on the challenges facing his country today.

The specific setup is as it was in real life; Miron jumps into the car after football practice and speaks to his father on the way to the airport to collect a gift sent from abroad. Karahoda combines the boy’s lamentations about his friends and coaches moving abroad, and his dream career as a soccer player being a dead-end in his homeland and spins them out using the journey to the airport and an absurdist stop-off at a customs office to collect a parcel. He uses these elements to engage in a broader commentary on a state system that lets down its people, leading to their apparently inevitable departure – a brain and talent drain.

This is emphasised by the film’s visual composition, which sees the camera looking through the windows and windscreen – either into or out of the car – for the majority of the film’s running time. The ‘on the way’ of the title at first seems to reference a line of dialogue, but evidently it becomes about transition and migration, the two characters en route, taking a trip, increasingly unsure of exactly where their lives are going to end up, but together, nonetheless.

Director, cinematography: Samir Karahoda
Cast: Ylber Mehmeti, Miron Karahoda
Producers: Eroll Bilibani, Samir Karahoda
Screenplay: Samir Karahoda, Miron Karahoda
Editing: Enis Saraci
Sound: Labinot Sponca
Art Direction: Leonora Mehmeti
Production Company: SK Films (Kosovo)
Venue: Sarajevo Film Festival (Competition Programme – Short Film)
In Albanian
15 minutes