Learning to Skateboard in a Warzone (If You're a Girl)

2020 0h 40m FA

👍

7.3

SOLID

★7.3TMDB · 46

Documentary

Synopsis

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The story of young Afghan girls learning to read, write and skateboard in Kabul.

“Some stories are better left unspoiled.”

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Cast

Fatima
Self
Kashida
Self

Credits

Behind the camera

Director: Carol Dysinger
Languages: Persian
Countries: Afghanistan, United Kingdom

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Did you know?

Fun facts 🍿

1 / 8

RUNTIME

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Tight 40-minute runtime — shorter than most television pilots.

MoodPlayr · trivia#01

2 / 8

ERA

Did you know

Released 6 years ago.

MoodPlayr · trivia#02

3 / 8

WORLD

Did you know

International production across 2 countries: Afghanistan, United Kingdom.

MoodPlayr · trivia#03

4 / 8

ERA

Did you know

Lean credit list — fewer than 30 people officially credited.

MoodPlayr · trivia#04

5 / 8

DIRECTOR

Did you know

Directed by Carol Dysinger, shot by Lisa Rinzler. Note their partnership — DPs and directors often return to each other across a career.

MoodPlayr · trivia#05

6 / 8

DIRECTOR

Did you know

Original score by Sasha Gordon. Worth a dedicated listen after — most great films lose half their impact without the score.

MoodPlayr · trivia#06

7 / 8

DIRECTOR

Did you know

Editor Mary Manhardt shaped the rhythm. On an edit-heavy film, the editor does more to control your pulse than the director.

MoodPlayr · trivia#07

8 / 8

CAST

Did you know

Fatima and Kashida carry the top of the cast.

MoodPlayr · trivia#08

Cinephile deep dive

The take

Carol Dysinger directs. Lisa Rinzler behind the camera. Sasha Gordon scores. Mary Manhardt cuts. Runs lean at under 100 minutes. Produced in Afghanistan, United Kingdom. Dialogue in Persian.

Trivia

Things worth knowing

1Tight 40-minute runtime — shorter than most television pilots.
2Released 6 years ago.
3International production across 2 countries: Afghanistan, United Kingdom.
4Lean credit list — fewer than 30 people officially credited.
5Directed by Carol Dysinger, shot by Lisa Rinzler. Note their partnership — DPs and directors often return to each other across a career.
6Original score by Sasha Gordon. Worth a dedicated listen after — most great films lose half their impact without the score.
7Editor Mary Manhardt shaped the rhythm. On an edit-heavy film, the editor does more to control your pulse than the director.
8Fatima and Kashida carry the top of the cast.
9IMDB entry: tt10397932 — still the authoritative cross-reference for credits and trivia.
10Only 46 TMDB ratings — you're getting ahead of the curve on this one.

The technical file

Cinematography: Lisa Rinzler
Original score: Sasha Gordon
Editing: Mary Manhardt
Runtime: 40 min · 0h 40m
Aspect ratio (typical): 1.37:1 (Academy)
Status: Released
Original language: FA
IMDB: Learning to Skateboard in a Warzone (If You're a Girl) (2020)

Awards

Academy Award for Best Documentary (Short Subject)
BAFTA Award for Best Short Film

Individual records documented via Wikidata; the summary above may count more.

Also by

Carol Dysinger

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Trailers & featurettes

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Community reviews

What people are saying

CinemaSerf2026-02-19
★ 7/10
Skateboarding seems to be a theme amongst short films in 2019, as this one and “Kamali” show us just how effective this sport can be when it comes to empowering young girls in a society where their roles and positions are mapped out along more traditional lines. This feature takes us into a school for girls - nicknamed “Skateistan” - where they are being taught to read and stay upright on their wheels, all whilst the resurgent Taliban are imposing themselves more and more in a Kabul that will likely change quite profoundly for both them and their opportunities. From the mouths of a couple of the confidently engaging girls like Fatima and Kashina, as well as through their actually quite brave teachers, we learn first hand how girls as young as thirteen are being taken out of what is still mandatory education and kept at home - ready for hopefully advantageous marriages to men, or boys if they are luckier, that they have never met. This doesn’t offer us a pre-formed judgment of those arrangements, but merely points them out and leaves us to look at families with as many as fourteen children and assess for ourselves. Optimistically, even though these parents may not have had any choices of their own, many are obviously keen on their daughters going to college, or university, and improving their own lots rather than face the same rigid future they faced themselves twenty or thirty years earlier. The children here prove to be very effective spokespeople for their generation and the skating serves nicely as a conduit for their own sort of courage in a society that doesn’t even allow them to go to a football match, much less play in one. This is a subtle critique on a religiously driven patriarchy that offers them, and us, hope. Unfortunately, given what we know six year later, it also points to the fragility of that aspiration.

Production companies