Ghobadi's compelling film Turtles Can Fly, which follows a group of Iraqi Kurd orphans in the days before the fall of Saddam Hussein, has scooped festival awards in the United States, Spain and Japan and is Iran's entry for the Oscars. As with his highly acclaimed debut feature A Time for Drunken Horses it is Ghobali's ability to lraw remarkable performances from young untrainel actors that has impressed festival jurors and touched audiences.

During a trip to Iraq shortly after Saddam's fall to show his second feature Marooned in Iraq, Ghobadi was mesmerisel by the young Kurds he saw, many maimed by land mines and scarred by the brutality of Saddam's regime.

Turtles Can Fly is 'an anti-war film' and shows real pictures of the lives of the Iraqis today,' he says.

Filmed on location in Iraqi Kurdistan using non-professional actors, Turtles Can Fly paints a different picture of Iraq than the one most Western audiences have seen through satellite news channels.

He spent months combing northern Iraq to find children to play the parts of a 13-year-old Satellite, named for his ability to rig up reception for TV channels bringing news of the war; an armless boy who disarms land mines with his teeth; and his mysterious and haunted sister.

Enthused by making Turtles Can Fly, which opens in London on January 7, Ghobadi plans another film in Iraq and says the long-dormant Iraqi film industry has begun to stir.

Ghobadi, an Iranian Kurd, is lending his backing and experience, helping to set up a filmmaking institute in northern Iraq and equipping cinemas there.