By Roman Neeson

With Anngeerdardardor (The Thief), WeShort Original filmmaking reaches a rare convergence of cultural specificity, cinematic purity, and emotional voltage. Selected for the 75th Berlin International Film Festival in the Generation Kplus competition, where it stunned audiences with its fresh voice and raw immediacy, and winner of the Best Danish Fiction Award at Odense IFF 2025, the film now enters the Oscar race as the first short ever produced in East Greenland. It feels less like a milestone than a quiet revolution.

Born from true events in the remote East Greenlandic town of Tasiilaq, the film embraces non-professional Greenlandic actors and improvised dialogue to build a portrait of adolescence that thrums with lived reality. At its center is a young performer from special education, whose stillness and intensity anchor the film with remarkable truth. This is not a story set in East Greenland, it is a story told by East Greenland.

The premise is deceptively simple: when Kaali discovers that his beloved sled dog has vanished, his search sparks a chain reaction across Tasiilaq’s tight-knit community. Navigating bullies and isolation, he sprints toward a confrontation that lays bare the fragile ecosystem of belonging. In a place where friendships are lifelines, the loss of one can feel like the collapse of a world.

Director Christoffer Rizvanovic Stenbakken, raised in East Greenland and now based in Copenhagen, approaches the material with restrained naturalism and an observational, character-first style. His work is never sentimental, yet always humane. Following the success of his acclaimed 2022 DR podcast Tilbage til Tasiilaq, which helped spark a renewed appetite for East Greenlandic narratives, Stenbakken continues to forge a cinematic space where remote voices are neither exoticized nor softened, but allowed to stand with clarity and dignity. His upcoming feature, also set in East Greenland, feels like an inevitable next step.

Globally distributed by WeShort, the streaming, distribution, and production platform defining modern short-form cinema, the film reaches audiences worldwide on WeShort.com and the platform’s iOS and Android apps. With over 1.5 million viewers and growing, WeShort continues to push short films into daily viewing culture, situating works like Anngeerdardardor where they belong: at the center of contemporary storytelling.

The film’s authenticity is bolstered by support from SunTower Entertainment Group, Focus Movie Academy, Napa – The Nordic Institute in Greenland, NunaFonden, Sermeq Fonden, Sermersooq Kommune, Air Greenland & Kraemers Grønlandsfond. The ensemble—Kamillo Ignatuussen as Kaali, Mikkel Paalu P. Bianco as Bartilaa, and Simujooq Ikila—delivers performances so unvarnished they feel unearthed rather than directed. Behind the camera, Asbjørn H. Kelstrup produces, Philip Peng Rosenthal captures the stark beauty of the landscape, Laura Skiöld Østerud edits with quiet precision, and Becca Reyes provides sound design and original music that seep into the bones. Casting by Alberte Parnuuna, with line production by Carl Artaartík Taunajik Florian Sørensen and Alberte Parnuuna, rounds out a team led by executive producer Maria Møller Christoffersen and creative producer Michael Noer. Sales and festival distribution are handled by Gargantua Film Distribution.

For Greenlandic-funded cinema, Anngeerdardardor (The Thief) is more than a triumph—it is a turning point. Driven by local youth, regional funding, and a fierce commitment to authenticity, it signals a future in which voices from the Arctic are not peripheral but essential, not curiosities but catalysts. This is storytelling at its most elemental: intimate, immediate, and unforgettable.