Feathered Cocaine
World Premiere

Feathered Cocaine

| Iceland | 80 MINUTES | English
Crime, Documentary

Behind drugs, people, and weapons, falcon smuggling has become the world's most mysterious and profitable illegal trade. To the wealthy elite throughout the Persian Gulf, falcon hunting is a passion beyond compare. The coveted birds regularly command prices from $25,000 to $1 million, earning them the nickname "feathered cocaine" as thieves race to ransack vast areas of the world in an addictive quest.

In their directorial debut, Icelandic filmmakers Thorkell Hardarson and Örn Marino Arnarson unspool the shady connections between this falcon trade and royal dynasties, the CIA and KGB, the oil industry, American government, and Al-Qaeda. At the center of their story is Alan Parrot, aka Hari Har Singh Khalsa. After graduating high school in the early 1970s, Alan tricked his parents and took off on a one-way ticket to Tehran, Iran; obsessed from an early age, all he ever wanted was to work with falcons. Raising and training the exotic creatures for the royal court, he went on to export falcons to the president of the UAE professionally, implicating him as the one who first spurred the modern economy for the birds. Hardarson and Arnarson's bold investigation reveals not only the wild behavior of men obsessed with a bird of prey, but the unlikely character behind the movement to impede their smuggling.


Cast & Credits
Directed by
Örn Marino Arnarson, Thorkell Hardarson, Örn Marino Arnarson, and Thorkell Hardarson
Thorkell Hardarson and Örn Marino Arnarson were born in Reykjavik, Iceland and have produced and directed as a team for nine years through their production company, Markell Productions. Feathered Cocaine is their third feature-length documentary and first in English.
Consulting Editor
Jeremy Stulberg
Editors
Thorkell Hardarson, Örn Marino Arnarson
Executive Producer
Diana Holtzberg
Director of Photography
Halldor Gunnarsson
Director
Thorkell Hardarson, Örn Marino Arnarson
Composer
Steingrimur E. Gudmundsson
* Rush Tickets available at venue except for
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The Rush system functions as a standby line that will form at the venue approximately one hour prior to scheduled start time. Admittance is based on availability and will begin roughly 10 minutes prior to program start time. Rush Tickets are the same price as advance tickets and are payable upon entry.

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