12/03/2025 - The director and the actor reflect on striking a complex tonal balance with their film, working with multiple languages on set and embracing the backgrounds of different collaborators and characters

l-r: Peiman Azizpour and Brwa Vahabpour (© Jonathan Vail)

Trondheim-raised writer-director Brwa Vahabpour has brought his debut feature, My Uncle Jens [+see also:
film review
interview: Brwa Vahabpour, Peiman Aziz…
film profile], to South by Southwest’s Narrative Feature Competition for its world premiere. The comedy-drama takes a sharp, witty approach to themes of identity, immigration and assimilation in the tale of Kurdish Norwegian teacher Akam (Peiman Azizpour), who is unexpectedly visited in Oslo from abroad by his uncle Khdr (Hamza Agoshi).

Cineuropa: The film’s first scene sets up the comedic-dramatic tone of the film very well. What kind of conversations did you have about the tone and style?
Brwa Vahabpour: The film is quite dynamic. We delve into different tones throughout the film. From the beginning, I always said that some humour lies in even the most dramatic circumstances. We really tried to take all the humorous bits from real life situations that the film is based upon. We worked a lot with Hamza, the actor who plays the uncle. We had a lot of rehearsals to find the rhythm and musicality of their conversations. It was several weeks of preparation.

What did the collaborative style look like during the shooting itself?
BV: Peiman is a professional actor, while Hamza is not – but he’s a very good actor and I love working with him. I’ve worked with him before, but he’s not a trained actor. Different actors have different needs, and I have to cater to those needs. There are several other first-time actors in the film, and that was a bit of a challenge, but I found it really rewarding. Many of the actors in the film have firsthand knowledge and experience that the characters in the film have. For the casting, we really went into the different [character] milieus to find real people.

Peiman Azizpour: We did have several meetings and lots of talks about the character of Akam and the uncle. It was because we knew that those two, by the end, are so close in the film.

BV: Because the film is in both Norwegian and Kurdish, that was a bit of a challenge production-wise because none of the crew knew Kurdish, but many of the actors only knew Kurdish. There were several times where the cinematographer had to be very attentive and listen to the dialogue and learn the rhythm of the language to know when to push in, when to pan and these kinds of things. The character of Akam doesn’t speak Kurdish that well – that’s a big part of the story. But Peiman speaks Kurdish very well, so he had to “dumb down” his language. We had different “levels” of Kurdish, one to four. Because we didn’t film chronologically, we had to say, “Oh, today’s level two.” That’s how we figured out how Akam would speak.

There are some crucial scenes talking about Akam’s father being part of the Kurdish Peshmerga resistance and security forces. Why was it important for you to incorporate that into the story?
BV: The film talks about how to deal with a feeling of shortcoming, or that you're not living up to your assigned role in a society. Akam deals with that with the Kurdish language because it’s something he has distanced himself from. His uncle also has an issue; he’s also in a similar situation. He’s also forced to speak a language and act in a certain way he’s not comfortable with. The difference is that Akam really embraces the language, culture and land. He finds language enriching in the end, whereas the uncle runs away from it for political reasons. It felt very natural for me to implement Peshmerga in the film without being confrontational with the audience. I felt that Akam’s father was a good way to get into that topic and to talk about the Kurdish plight.

The character of Elina, who works for the Norwegian Directorate of Immigration, complicates the story. There are moments where she jokes about certain things, but she also seems embarrassed about working for the division that deports people. Were some traits drawn from how immigration is seen in Norway today?
BV: It’s a good question, and it’s a very interesting character because of that dichotomy where you are embarrassed about working there, but she has her reasons and talks about it in the film. Like all of the other characters in the film, they’re inspired by people I know. Sarah Francesca, the actor who plays Elina, worked really hard to get into the role of someone who works at the Directorate of Immigration. She was calling me all the time and asking whether the character would say this line based on the fact that she worked there. She also visited the Directorate for a day to see how they work. 

The film conveys a breadth of perspectives from people across Norwegian society today. Do you resonate with specific characters in the film?
PA: For me, it’s mainly about the writing. I can see myself in Akam, but I can see myself in the uncle or Elina. We talk a lot about identity. For me, if I didn’t have those two cultures, Kurdish and Norwegian, I don't think it would be as easy for me to understand both sides.