Bad Dream

The film “Bad Dreams” was directed by a young filmmaker from Artsakh (Nagorno-Karabakh), Arnold Ghazaryan (born in 2001), shortly after the 44-day war in 2020. Despite the constant fear for their lives and the psychological terror caused by the blockade—which cut 120,000 Armenians off from the outside world for nearly 10 months and triggered a humanitarian crisis—the Armenians in Artsakh, Armenia, and across the globe did the impossible to stop the ethnic cleansing. We tried not to lose hope until the very last day and still cannot believe that, since September 2023, Artsakh has, for the first time in its thousand-year history, been emptied of Armenians. Sadly, Azerbaijan succeeded in carrying out the forced displacement of every last person in Artsakh, committing yet another genocide. It is deeply important to me to use this film—created by a director from a land the world refuses to recognize and whose eradication goes unpunished—to raise awareness of this crime. This short film reveals the powerful will to live, the struggle for existence, the resilience, and the ability of Armenians to transform pain into strength.