Asbarez – The CineCulture Series and the Armenian Studies Program at California State University, Fresno, are sponsoring a special screening of the film Lost Birds at 5:30pm on Friday, April 7, in the Leon and Pete Peters Educational Auditorium (west end of the SaveMart Center, near Shaw and Woodrow Avenues), on the Fresno State campus.

Directors Ela Alyamac and Arda Perdeci will be flying to Fresno from Turkey to be the discussants at the screening of their movie.

Set against the backdrop of the First World War in a small Armenian village in Ottoman Anatolia, Lost Birds is a historical fairy tale told through the eyes of a young brother and sister left behind in the 1915 Armenian genocide.

Lost Birds is the first film made in Turkey to depict the Armenian Genocide of 1915. It was brought to the screen by the five years of work, persistence, and courage of filmmakers Aren Perdeci and Ela Alyamac, who share writing and directing credits. Lost Birds handles the task of telling a very dramatic story in a fairy tale narrative and this leads the audience to feel something magical yet so real at the same time.

Bedo and Maryam’s happy home life is torn apart when their grandfather is apprehended and taken away by soldiers. Now, forbidden to go outside by their mother, one morning, the two children sneak away to play in their secret cave. But, when they return, they find their home and the entire village empty. Together, with the wounded bird they have been nursing back to health, the children embark on a perilous journey to find their mother.