'Pain is Mine' by Farshid Akhlaghi Joins the Auteur Cinema Archive

A single room, a single take, and twelve minutes of uninterrupted observation. An intimate exploration of physical suffering, resilience, and the transformative power of music.

The Auteur Cinema Archive proudly welcomes Pain is Mine (Australia) by Iranian-Australian filmmaker Farshid Akhlaghi, a profoundly intimate documentary that demonstrates how the simplest cinematic approach can produce an extraordinary emotional impact.

One day. One room. One take.

Following spinal surgery, Robyn Youl has lived with severe, persistent pain. For years, painkillers offered a form of refuge, until she made the difficult decision to stop taking them. What remains is a daily confrontation with her own body, its limitations, and the search for relief beyond medication.

Rather than approaching this deeply personal story through conventional documentary techniques, Akhlaghi makes a radical formal choice: he tells it entirely in a single, uninterrupted shot.

There are no edits to redirect our attention, no montage to manipulate our emotions, and no cinematic shortcuts to compress the experience. The camera simply remains present, allowing time to unfold naturally. In doing so, the filmmaker establishes an unusual relationship between the viewer and his subject. We are not merely watching someone describe suffering; we are invited to share a small fragment of the time in which that suffering exists.

This distinction is fundamental to the film's power. Pain is an intensely subjective experience, difficult to communicate and almost impossible to visualize. By refusing to interrupt the continuity of the moment, Akhlaghi allows duration itself to become expressive. Time is no longer simply the framework of the documentary; it becomes part of its meaning.

Yet Pain is Mine is not exclusively a film about suffering. At its heart lies the possibility of finding comfort through music. What begins as an observation of physical vulnerability gradually opens into a reflection on the capacity of art to offer solace where conventional solutions have reached their limits.

The film's formal restraint makes this emotional dimension all the more affecting. Nothing needs to be exaggerated. The subject's presence, the passage of time, and the relationship between pain and music are sufficient.

Curator Kris De Meester on the inclusion:

"One shot. Pure cinema. Sometimes the most powerful cinematic decisions are also the simplest. Farshid Akhlaghi understands that the camera doesn't always need to move, that a story doesn't necessarily need editing, and that emotion doesn't have to be manufactured through technique. What fascinates me about Pain is Mine is the filmmaker's absolute commitment to his formal choice. By allowing a single shot to carry the entire film, he places an extraordinary amount of trust in his subject, in the moment, and ultimately in the audience. There is nowhere to hide, neither for the filmmaker nor for the viewer. And that is precisely where the film finds its strength. We experience time differently. We become more attentive to the smallest gestures, the slightest changes in expression, the emotional nuances that conventional editing might easily overlook. The film reminds us that cinema is not defined by the number of shots, but by what happens within them. For me, this is filmmaking reduced to its essence: a human being, a camera, and the passage of time. Nothing more is needed to create something genuinely moving."

Farshid Akhlaghi, an alumnus of the Victorian College of the Arts in Melbourne, has developed a body of work spanning narrative, experimental, and documentary filmmaking. Born in Tehran in 1981, he moved to Australia in 2012, continuing to explore the possibilities of cinematic storytelling across different forms and subjects.

Pain is Mine has received considerable international recognition, including a Special Mention Award at the prestigious Camerimage Film Festival in Poland, Best Short Documentary at DOC LA in Los Angeles, and Best Experimental Documentary at the Ghent Viewpoint Documentary Film Festival. The film has also screened at the Montreal World Film Festival, Antenna Documentary Film Festival, Brussels Independent Film Festival, and numerous other international festivals.

These distinctions reflect the achievement of a film that is both formally uncompromising and deeply accessible. Its experimental character does not distance the viewer from its subject; on the contrary, it creates an unusual degree of intimacy.

In a cinematic landscape increasingly characterized by rapid editing, constant movement, and an abundance of visual information, Pain is Mine offers a compelling alternative. It asks us to remain, to observe, and to discover how much can be communicated when a filmmaker resists the temptation to intervene.

By including Pain is Mine in the Auteur Cinema Archive, we celebrate Farshid Akhlaghi's ability to transform a seemingly modest cinematic premise into a profound encounter with human vulnerability and resilience.

It is a reminder that cinema, at its purest, is not necessarily about showing us more. Sometimes, it is about giving us the time to truly see.

Watch 'Pain is Mine' on Whush: https://www.whush.com/videos/pain-is-mine