The story of a 5 year old Afghan girl who wants to go to school against all odds. Bakhtay, a little girl living in the caves under the remains of the Buddha statues of Bamyan (which were destroyed by the Taliban in 2001), becomes obsessed with the idea of going to school.

In her sophomore feature, Hana Makhmalbaf—who was only 14 when she first screened a film at Cannes!—tells the story of a precocious girl in Afghanistan. Interweaving poetry into social commentary, Buddha Collapsed Out of Shame is beautifully insistent on creativity as an essential part of childhood.