Sermon to the Void

After being selected as the MIRAGE Film of the Year last year for his deeply affectingSermon to the Birds, Azerbaijani director Hilal Baydarov returns with a work of even more captivating cinema. Premiering at this year’s Venice Film Festival, the film marks anotherbold step in Baydarov’s singular artistic journey. Currently in production on his next project, Hilal will join us for an in-depth conversation following the screening.

Hilal Baydarov, already a towering presence in art-cinema from his “Sermon” trilogy, follows Shah Ismail on a metaphysical quest: to find, amidst impending oblivion, the mythical water of life. The film immerses us in a liminal realm that pulses with spiritual unease and surreal beauty, where every droplet of memory, every whisper of belief, becomes a lifeline.

Baydarov’s cinematic language, elevates the narrative to mythic oscillation: the search becomes less about destination than the weight each moment carries in the face of extinction. At the 82nd Venice International Film Festival, where the film world-premiered out of competition, critics noted its “existential lyricism” and “haunting simplicity.” Viewers found themselves drawn into its contemplative pace, a ritual of remembrance sung in the spaces between words.

Baydarov, acclaimed for his deep sensitivity to place and interiority, reaffirms himself here not as a documentarian but as a modern-myth maker. Sermon to the Void is a testament to cinema's ability to hold silence and myth in a single frame, an echo of faith in the void, and a final sermon to what remains.

Director’s Statement:

In Sermon to the Void, I sought to speak in the hush between endings. Shah Ismail’s journey is not about escaping oblivion, but preserving belief, meaning, myth, when everything disappears. This film is my final utterance toward what remains: faith, longing, memory. A sermon uttered into the void.