Event

"The filmmakers capture extraordinary adventure...[features] one of the most exciting and daringly filmed chase scenes in the recent cinema."  - Richard Brody, The New Yorker

"Absolutely stunning… the type of documentary you'd expect Terrence Malick or Michael Haneke to make."- Joshua Brunsting, CriterionCast 

 
"Poetic...Haunting...These Birds Walk serves as a reminder of the resilience of children and how little it takes to keep hope alive."- Betsy Sharkey, Los Angeles Times

"Even though Tariq and Mullick's film takes place halfway around the world from most of the people who will ever see this film, it is a (case) study into the universal need for a home."- Gabrielle Lipton, Slant

In Karachi, Pakistan, a runaway boy's life hangs on one critical question: where is home? The streets, an orphanage, or with the family he fled in the first place? Simultaneously heartwrenching and life-affirming, THESE BIRDS WALK documents the struggles of these wayward street children and the samaritans looking out for them in an ethereal and inspirational story of resilience.

Penn Pakistan Society presents the exclusive screening of These Birds Walk. Filmed over nearly three years, THESE BIRDS WALK is the story of Omar, a high-spirited young boy of 9 or 10 who is living in a house for runaways; he has fled his difficult rural home life for the dangerous streets of Karachi, and is trying to find a safe haven somewhere amidst the chaos of his country and his family. Attempting to help him is Asad, a young ambulance driver who works for the dispatch center adjacent to the runaways’ home. A former street kid, Asad sees something of himself in these children, and reluctantly but regularly risks his life to reunite them with their families. 

Hanging over both of them, though only briefly glimpsed in the film, is the presence of the founder of both the orphanage and the ambulance dispatch center: Abdul Sattar Edhi, the most deeply revered philanthropist in Pakistan. Edhi has established a system of nursing homes, women’s shelters, orphanages and hospitals – a large army of humanitarians gathered in his name to fight the country’s rampant gang violence, ethnic conflict and poverty. He runs the largest private ambulance service in the world.