Credit: Red Lion
On Monday 17 August 2026, Luxembourg production company Red Lion announced that Men in Towels (2026), the latest short film by Luxembourgish-Iranian filmmaker Kiyan Agadjani, had been selected for the European Shorts competition at the 32nd Sarajevo Film Festival in Bosnia and Herzegovina.
The eighteen-minute film had its European premiere on Tuesday 18 August 2026, in the presence of the director. This followed its world premiere in the Short Panorama section of the Beijing International Film Festival in April 2026.
Men in Towels follows Robert, an angry man who is sent to a spa after being diagnosed with a terminal stress-related illness. There, he meets Marco, another patient whose relaxed attitude and sense of humour deeply irritate him.
Born in Luxembourg to Iranian parents, Kiyan Agadjani studied film at the University of Kent in the United Kingdom (UK), where he made his first short film, George Barton (2022), which received awards in Avignon in France and Trier in Germany. He subsequently returned to Luxembourg, where he currently works as a screenwriter, director and assistant director.
His second short film, Arman & Elisa (2023), won the Best Narrative Short Film award at the Austin Film Festival and became eligible for the 2025 Academy Awards. His third, Linda, Linda! (2024), received the award for Best Short Film at the 2025 Lëtzebuerger Filmpräis and was screened internationally, including at Oscar-qualifying festivals HollyShorts, deadCenter and the Hawai'i International Film Festival, as well as at the Nuits en Or des César in Paris.
Men in Towels is Kiyan Agadjani's fourth short film. He is currently developing his first feature film Black Cats.
The film was written and directed by Kiyan Agadjani and produced by Vincent Quénault and Jeanne Geiben for Red Lion. The cast includes Timothy Lone, Oscar Martin and Alessia Raschella, with cinematography and editing by Anselm Havu and music by Grégory Ney. The Luxembourg production received support from Film Fund Luxembourg.
