The Red Suitcase

The red suitcase is the only item left on the luggage carousel. We watch it go round and round before the girl retrieves it. Her phone rings and she presses it close to her face. “I’m still on the plane,” she lies. People behaving strangely in airports tend to attract attention. It doesn’t take long before two members of the security staff home in on the girl. They can see that she’s upset, but that doesn’t mean that it couldn’t be dangerous, so they open up the suitcase with care and are relieved to find that it contains only clothes, art supplies and a few drawings whose beauty they cannot help but remark upon. The girl is clearly really uncomfortable about them touching her things; before long, we will understand that they are all she has in the world, presumably the most precious of her former possessions. Do the drawings represent lost loved ones? Opening her passport and realising that she’s only 16, they express concern, but she doesn’t understand their language and they don’t know what to do to help her.

Outside the baggage area, a man is waiting, clutching a bouquet of flowers. We don’t immediately know who he is, but we can see that the girl is terrified of him. Can she get out of the airport without him seeing her? In the toilets, she removes her hijab, doing the opposite of what Europeans tend to expect is involved in the creation of a disguise. She has some big decisions to make. Director Cyrus Neshvad hesitates to make anything too explicit. He lets us feel lost like the girl does, so that our primary guide is her emotional state.

Airports are scary places if one isn’t used to them – vast and open and yet somehow also mazelike. Bronzed blondes with glaring white teeth stare down from posters. Wherever the girl goes, the man keeps turning up. A money changer asks if she’s okay, but she doesn’t understand. This whole world is alien to her. Even if she successfully gets away, it will be very difficult for her to avoid other dangers, for her to find a way to stay safe. She’s clever, but can it be enough?

Nawelle Ewad is riveting in the lead, barely speaking, telling us everything we need to know with her face and the movement of her body. Neshvad, who is himself Iranian-born and now resident in Luxembourg, where the film is set, makes magnificent use of space and of the contrast between the brightly lit airport and the blackness of the night beyond it. One of the strongest contenders for Best Live Action Short at the 2023 Oscars, The Red Suitcase contains an ocean of troubles and, like Pandora’s box, just a little hope.