[The Quarter of Scarecrows] exposes the misery and sorrow of war through the thickets of symbolic imagery. The land where the years of the Iran-Iraq war left its scars attracts a troop of crows. Worried for his crops, a farm owner, Miran, calls upon the help of fellow farmer Hama. Hama erects scarecrows, employs village kids and soldiers to shoot and repel crows, all to no avail. Complaints from the villagers grow louder when a child dies in a mine explosion while crow hunting. The conflict further intensifies when Miran evicts villagers to secure crop warehouses. The land turns into the vacuum of death and greed. Where people leave, scarecrows take over. To Kurds, the scarecrow symbolizes the “Rain Bride” that brings the blessing of rain to their land. Greed turns the blessing into a zombie land that deserts souls and fosters carnage. Director, Hassan Ali Mahmoud put rich visual symbolism on display to accentuate the simple storyline and his agenda, a laudable feat for a rookie director. (KIM Ji-seok)