No. 44 · Short Film
THURSDAY; 5 AM
Directed by Seyed Behyad Najafi & Tahereh Forghani
Iran · 19 min
Thursday, 5 AM After a debate over human nature, two friends test modern morality: can a stranger be paid to bury a suicide victim? As they pull three passengers into their disturbing wager, what began as a dark social experiment spins into a chilling reality.
Streams 21 September 2026 to 28 September 2026, Berlin time. Every ticket is one Audience Award vote.
Trailer
About the film
Thursday, 5 AM Driven by a tense debate about human empathy, two friends set out to prove a point about modern society. One claims people have become so callous that anyone would agree to bury a suicide victim for the right price; the other refuses to believe humanity is lost. To settle the score, they drive through the city, offering money to three different strangers in exchange for completing the act. But as each passenger steps into the car—a haggling pragmatist, a struggling commuter, and a strangely willing youth—the line between a harmless wager and a deadly plan begins to blur. What starts as a quiet urban experiment slowly unravels into a disturbing puzzle of guilt, morality, and hidden motives, leaving them to face a reality far more chilling than the bet itself.
Content notes: Suicide
- Runtime
- 19 min
- Category
- Short Film
- Country
- Iran
- Year
- 2026
- Language
- Persian (Farsi)
- Aspect ratio
- 2.39:1
Stills
Seyed Behyad Najafi & Tahereh Forghani
Tahereh Forghani and Seyed Behyad Najafi, Iranian filmmakers based in Tehran, spent years working as theatre directors before turning to cinema. Both trained in theatre at university, building a body of stage work that shaped their distinct sensibility as filmmakers. Thursday, 5 AM marks their debut as film directors, a project born from years of creative collaboration in theatre and translated into a new visual language. The film reflects how a theatrical eye can be reimagined through the frame of cinema, opening a new chapter for both artists as they step confidently into feature filmmaking.
Credits
- Directed by
- Seyed Behyad Najafi & Tahereh Forghani
- Written by
- Seyed Behyad Najafi & Tahereh Forghani
- Produced by
- Seyed Bakhtiar Najafi
- Production company
- Ma'agraph Art Group
- Cinematography
- Erfan Ghobadi
- Editing
- Armin Forghani
- Principal cast
- Seyed Mohammad Safavi, Kianoush SoltaniMatin, Armin Forghani, Fatemeh Amouzegar, Hami Ghanbarzadeh
THURSDAY; 5 AM is part of the Official Selection of the BIUFF Founding Edition 2026.
