Yılmaz Özdil is a film director born in Hakkari (1979). He did his master's degree at the Paris 1 Panthéon Sorbonne University on the geopolitical border treatment in Kurdish cinema. In 2013 he defended his Ph.D. dissertation entitled "The Visual Construction of Kurdish Identities in Cinema" at the University Paris 3 Sorbonne Nouvelle. From 2004 to 2016, he directed several documentary films and also worked as assistant director in several Kurdish films shot in Turkey, Iraqi Kurdistan and France. His short film "The Heavy Burden" was screened at more then 100 festivals around the globe and picked up many awards. He is currently working at Mardin Artuklu University as an assistant professor.