My Favourite Cake (2024)

Direction: Maryam Moghaddam, Behtash Sanaeeha
Country: Iran 

Iranian filmmakers Maryam Moghaddam and Behtash Sanaeeha bring us My Favourite Cake, a tragicomic romantic drama set in Tehran and starred by Lily Farhadpour and Esmail Mehrabi. Farhadpour portraits Mahin, a 70-year-old widow who, feeling stifled by loneliness and routine, decides to seek her personal freedom in a society closely monitored by the regime. Her journey brings her to Faramarz (Mehrabi), a divorced taxi driver and former soldier who mirrors her isolation. Their unexpected and spirited romance blossoms with ease; their dialogue feels natural, and their expressions of joy are vibrant. Love and optimism breathe new life into their world, casting their future in a hopeful light. But is there really a future for them? 

The basic plot is infused with immeasurable joy and overwhelming sadness in equal measures, relying on the warmth of its characters and beautifully crafted imagery that radiates light and life. Mahin and Faramarz quickly become endearing to the audience, their happiness infectious as their one-night connection grows more meaningful with every frame.

My Favourite Cake offers an enriching blend of heartfelt storytelling subtly woven with political undertones expressed through repressed emotions, ethical conflicts, and the constant vigilance of nosy regime loyalists. Awarded at the Berlinale, this film presents a stirring and genuine portrayal of romance later in life, a slice of life that resonates deeply. Unfortunately, the directors were unable to attend the festival to receive their awards, as Iranian authorities confiscated their passports and imposed travel bans.

The Seed of the Sacred Fig (2024)

Direction: Mohammad Rasoulof
Country: Iran

Iranian filmmaker Mohammad Rasoulof is renowned for his fearless critique of Iran's authoritarian regime and the oppression, injustice, and restrictions that haunt his homeland. His acclaimed films — The White Meadows (2009), Manuscripts Don’t Burn (2013), A Man of Integrity (2017), and the Golden Berlin Bear-winner There Is No Evil (2020) — have been deemed ‘propaganda against the system’, leading to his imprisonment twice before he ultimately fled to Germany. Rasoulof’s new film, The Seed of the Sacred Fig, an outstanding family drama and political thriller, follows in this brave tradition, winning both the Jury Special Prize and the FIPRESCI Award at Cannes. The idea for the story first came to Rasoulof while in jail, inspired by the Woman, Life, Freedom Movement in Iran.

The film, a tense closed-door family drama that surprisingly veers into paranoia-fueled thriller, was entirely shot in secret. With taut precision and anchored by riveting performances, this nearly three-hour epic keeps viewers on edge as it dissects both patriarchal and societal authoritarianism with sharp insight, highlighting the powerful struggle of young women and students for freedom. Rasoulof’s unflinching camera captures so well this clash between the parents' rigid conservatism and the children’s pragmatic visions for change. 

Offering content that is frightening on a deep and dark level, The Seed of the Sacred Fig packs an absolute cinematic punch that draws viewers into its mesmerizing spell of madness, obsession, and resistance.

Terrestrial Verses (2024)

Direction: Ali Asgari, Alireza Khatami
Country: Iran

Terrestrial Verses, a directorial collaboration between the multi-awarded Ali Asgari and Canada-based Iranian-American filmmaker Alireza Khatami, shares several thematic strings with Abbas Kiarostami’s 2002 docufiction Ten. However, while Kiarostami’s work was centered only on women, this project includes men, presenting a series of nine vignettes that expose injustice, absurdities, and intolerable abuse of power. Shot in seven days and produced by the directors at their own expense, the film captures the essence of an oppressive system through the experiences of nine ordinary citizens of Tehran interviewed by authorities.

Among the most compelling stories are a confrontational teenager punished at school for arriving with her motorcyclist boyfriend, a young woman seemingly caught driving without hijab, two shameful job interviews (one laying bare sexism and the other religion-based discrimination), and a desperate filmmaker whose work, based on true events, is censored from start to finish. It’s a fine blend of realism, cynicism, and humor.

Following conceptual simplicity, Terrestrial Verses is minimalist in its visuals but cathartic in its dialogue. This pain-filled satire does so many things, all of them well. Opting for explicit directness, it forces the viewer to look straight into the eyes of victims of a controlling and toxic Iranian society marred by austere religious and political principles that serve only those in power. Films like these are important, denouncing oppression in the hopes of achieving freedom, in a relentlessly clever middle finger to baseless censorship. Although fictionalized, this accessible and defiant film offers enlightening insights into contemporary Iran.

No Bears (2022)

Direction: Jafar Panahi
Country: Iran

Filmmaker Jafar Panahi, who was arrested in July 2022 for propaganda against the Iranian regime, releases another clandestine film that shows his tenacious resistance in the face of an outrageous governmental ban that impedes him from working normally and leaving the country. Even bounded and watched in his moves, his creativity and true passion for cinema are outstanding.

No Bears is a smartly scripted independent film that is as attractive in form as in substance. It’s a fiction-reality hybrid tragedy with a few subtle touches of comedy whose rewards are timeless.

Panahi stars as himself. He spends a number of days in a small Iranian village near the Turkish border, but is furtively directing a film in Tehran with the help of a small crew. They are attempting to stage the true story of Zara (Mina Kavani) and Bakhtiar (Bakhtiar Panjei), a married couple who strive to leave the country with fake passports. At the same time, in the village, he witnesses the tragedy of a young couple in love, betrayed by the severity of outdated ancient traditions. 

Standing near the border, the filmmaker is tempted to cross it. He’s observed closely by suspicious and superstitious locals, and learns that even taking a simple picture can cause him serious problems. 

The action tenses up by the end, and there’s a level of urgency and frustration that screams in every shot; it’s the pure magic of cinema versus the harsh pain of reality presented with simple scenarios and genuine characters. I’m amazed at how Panahi transforms the truth to tell the truth, creating situations with astringent emotion and sharp political commentary. When censors try to tie his hands, he responds with this: a new gem of Iranian cinema.

Holy Spider (2022)

Direction: Ali Abbasi
Country: Iran

Holy Spider, Ali Abbasi’s third feature film, didn’t have the desired impact in me because of its narrative process. The director, who teamed up with Afshin Kamran Bahrami in the script, based himself in the real serial murder case that led Saeed Hanaei, an ultra-religious bricklayer and ex-war vet, to kill 16 women between 2000 and 2001 in the holy Iranian city of Mashhad. Abbasi, who marveled many cinephiles in 2018 with Border, deliberately deviated from the facts in an attempt to give misogyny a broader sense. He shot the film in Jordan.

The relatively unknown Iranian-French actress Zar Amir Ebrahimi plays the journalist who would be key in the capture of Saeed, impersonated without brilliancy by Mehdi Bajestani. Even when resisting thrills, this rote serial-killer thriller work minimally, but Holy Spider is too programmatic and a bit academic in its effort to denounce Iran’s religious fanaticism and discrimination against women. Methodically paced, the film keeps you squirming in your seat, but then the characters feel a bit superficial and the homicidal rampage seldom surprising. 

Nadim Carlsen’s artfully unsoiled cinematography adds an air of suffocating rectitude in a sick machismo manifesto that, alternating strong and fragile sections, piles up crime scenarios with intermittent tension. The coldness of the director’s gaze ends up freezing our blood. This is aggravated by the fact that we know upfront who the killer is. The semi-fictional account could have benefited from darker atmospheres, while the legacy of blood and murder left by the proud killer is somewhat turned lighter by the end. Holy Spider doesn’t add up to a fully realized thriller.

Ballad of a White Cow (2021)

Direction: Behtash Sanaeeha, Maryam Moghaddam
Country: Iran 

The heartbreaking story depicted in Ballad of a White Cow is anchored in mourning, resilience, remorse, and moral dilemma. Written and directed by Behtash Sanaeeha and Maryam Moghadam, who also stars, the film is a quietly shattering meditation on capital punishment and the condition of women in ultra-rigid Iran. 

The topics couldn’t have been clearer and more subtlety depicted. The camera turns to Mina Eghbali (Moghadam), an anguished widow who learns that the execution of her husband, wrongly accused of murder, was a mistake. The state offers her financial compensation for the error, but Mina, whose grieving eyes convey an infinite sadness, still demands a formal apology from the responsible judges, wishing to make them accountable for her loss. 

This brave widow, who works in a dairy factory, decided to live alone with her 7-year-old deaf daughter (Avin Poor Raoufi), but that's also a problem. She's being sued by her father-in-law, who wants the guardianship of the child. For being a widow, she’s forced to move out of her Tehran apartment, but a stranger called Reza (Alireza Sani Far), saying to be a former friend of her husband, miraculously appears in her life, saving her from trouble.

This tale of grief, injustice and reprisal, decays in the last quarter, just to pack a punch with an unexpected final twist. The emotions are firmly kept in check throughout a story that brings enough to the table as another heinous example of wrongful conviction in the Iranian judicial history. Moghadam carries the film on her shoulders, assuring that Ballad of a White Cow becomes a pertinent and beautifully acted piece of work in its own right.

A Hero (2021)

Direction: Asghar Farhadi
Country: Iran 

A simple and efficient storytelling opposes to shifting complex emotions in this new drama film by the celebrated Iranian filmmaker Asghar Farhadi (A Separation, 2011; The Salesman, 2016). His ninth feature won the prestigious Palme D’Or in Cannes, marking a return to top form and to his Iran after an unimpressive experience in Spain with Everybody Knows (2018).

The protagonist here is Rahim Soltani (Amir Jadidi), an honest sign painter and calligrapher who was imprisoned for debt after being double-crossed by a business partner. During a two-day leave, he becomes in possession of a lost bag with gold coins that can easily pay his debt and free him from prison. But Rahim is too honest for that, and decides to return the bag to the owner. Through this pure act of selflessness, he expects to be forgiven and start a new life with the woman he loves, Farkhondeh (Sahar Goldoost). Lamentably, nothing goes as planned. 

While following Rahim’s dramatic journey, we are plunged into a personal meditation on morality and psychological societal mechanisms permeated by fake news and conspiration. Farhadi's style is direct, realist and sympathetic, and the film, bolstered by an instinctively fluid camerawork, is acted with rigor and intelligence. In his first collaboration with the distinguished director, Jadidi was able to convey the controlled panic of a person who lost face in a society that is implacably quick to judge. All in all, it's so easy to turn honesty into humiliation. 

As a shattering experience that doesn't stint on uncomfortable scenes, A Hero is another impeccable entry in Farhadi’s rich catalogue of timeless contemporary classics.

Yalda, a Night For Forgiveness (2021)

Direction: Massoud Bakhshi
Country: Iran

Hyper-dramatized and crippled by a slender script, Yalda, A Night for Forgiveness exposes some of the shameful breaches of the Sharia law through a humiliating situation. Maryam (Sadaf Asgari) - a jailed 22-year-old Iranian woman accused to kill her 65-year-old husband for money - is led to a widely popular reality show where she can escape the death penalty if granted pardon. The only person who can give her life back is the upper-class, if indebted, Mona (Behnaz Jafari) - the only child of the deceased - who, although resentful and arrogant, considers the forgiveness just to receive the blood money.

This situation is peppered by the fact that Maryam, who was pregnant at the time of the tragedy, ended up losing her baby. Highly agitated and impatient, she claims it was all unintentional instead of playing her ‘role’ for the audience. 

The writer-director Massoud Bakhshi actually inspired himself in a real Iranian talk show called “Honeymoon”, giving the film airs of a documentary (there’s three in his five-piece filmography) that rings untrue. I felt the story was being narrated as someone who stutters while speaking. It was hard to connect with the central character since the director is quick to stimulate the mind but not the heart. His idea turned out too formulaic in its curvilinear dramatic arc to convince. 

Among scenes that feel whether awkwardly forced or dragging, Yalda only scarcely produces some excitement. It’s an unpassionate, conventional and timid work, which I’m not prepared to forgive.

There Is No Evil (2021)

Direction: Mohammad Rasoulof
Country: Iran

Four short, if complex, stories centered on the topic of capital-punishment and immersed in moral dilemma is what the Iranian director Mohammad Rasoulof (A Man Of Integrity, 2019) offers us in There Is No Evil, his seventh fictional feature and the one that led him to prison and house arrest (just like Jafar Panahi) via the fierce censorship exerted by the authoritarian political regime of Iran.

With pragmatism, Rasoulof doesn’t condemn individuals but rather the political system behind the acts, posing questions about morality, justice and personal liberty.

Cerebral and presented with sang-froid, the first story centers on a husband/father (Ehsan Mirhosseini) in his family routines; the second chapter is thrilling and defiant of the system, focusing on a jailed Iranian soldier (Kaveh Ahangar) who refuses to kill; the third tale is painful and complex as it follows another soldier (Mohammad Valizadegan) who crosses the woods to visit his girlfriend (Mahtab Servati) but is struck by an unexpected surprise; and finally, the fourth story, the most intriguing of them all, is marked by a nice twist as an outcast doctor (Mohammad Seddighimehr) welcomes his Germany-based niece (director’s daughter Baran Rasoulof) as she visits the parched mountainous area where he lives.

The very naturalistic performances enhance the conflicts of conscience and the questions on how to deal with such a complex issue. How can you fight for your freedom and make your choice when your government is criminal and wants you to act according its ways? Although uneven, this is a brave, revelatory film from a smart filmmaker who presents things from the perspective of the executioners, drawing attention to the impact of their acts on themselves and the ones who surround them.

Sun Children (2021)

Direction: Majid Majidi
Country: Iran

Majid Majidi, a director of righteous social conviction, returns to his effective screen formula to denounce the struggles of children in contemporary Iran. His latest drama film, Sun Children, is dedicated to the 150 million children forced to illegal labor in order to survive, whether because of some misfortune in life or to comply with the wish of their irresponsible parents. 

The story he wrote with Nima Javidi centers on Ali Zamani (newcomer Rouhollah Zamani), a 12-year-old street-wise who works in a garage since a car accident sent his mother to a public hospital. His boss is a local gangster, Hashem (Ali Nassirian), who assigns him with a complex mission: to find a treasure buried under the town's cemetery. The underground tunnel that leads there has its entrance at the Sun School, located next to it, where Ali and his three companions will have to enroll to gain access.

The charitable yet bankrupted school happens to be more like a blessing than a burden, filled with 280 rebellious yet inseparable street kids in need of care, and fronted by a sympathetic principal (Ali Ghabeshi) who always tries to understand first before educate them accordingly. 

This sad song abounds with sweat and frustration, and its energy is unfluctuating throughout, even at those times when a circumstantial emotional manipulation tries to impose, fortunately, with no major consequences. In fact, the film is ultimately hopeless but never bleak, taking a realistic look at one of the most serious issues in the Iranian society. And speaking of issues, in a parallel incident, the police is not spared for its excess of zeal and lack of tact.

Sun Children might not be among Majidi's best works such as Children of Heaven (1997), The Color of Paradise (1999) and The Song of Sparrows (2008), but its visual acuteness together with the powerful message makes it a ride bound to be taken seriously.

3 Faces (2019)

Direction: Jafar Panahi
Country: Iran

Even facing a 20-year filmmaking ban imposed by the Iranian government, director Jafar Panahi continues to employ up-to-the-minute techniques as a mean to tell interesting stories, where the pivotal simplicity never discards any emotional peak or tension. He really knows how to blur the line between fiction and reality, and 3 Faces, the fourth film to be released under his filmmaking interdiction (the others were This Is Not a Film, Closed Curtain, and Taxi), is another step forward.

Panahi plays himself, as well as the popular actress Behnaz Jafari (Blackboards). The latter receives a startling video message from Marzieh Rezaei, a young actress wannabe from the rural Northwestern village of Saran, whose conservative family strictly opposes her going to Tehran to study acting. Impulsively, Jafari asks the director to drive her to that village in order to assure that nothing happened to the desperate girl. According to her loved ones, she had vanished three days before without a trace.

After discussing if the video was posteriorly edited or not, the pair experiences a reality that has nothing to do with their lives. Interesting happenings keep us alert - an elder woman lies down in the grave she just dug for herself; in a first phase, the villagers think the visitors are there to solve their gas and electricity problems; they learn that the village has more parables than inhabitants and have too many gardens but no doctors. In fact, these people are stuck in traditions and it's no wonder that Marzieh’s older brother considers her aspirations dishonorable.

During the investigative examination, there are some funny moments. I’m remembering when Panahi is forced to honk while driving to be given passage in a narrow road, or when he gets a phone call from his mother, who demands some attention and asks him about the rumors of a new film.

Ms. Jafari doesn’t know how to react. She feels scared for the girl, but at the same time dragged into a manipulation. There’s a moment she even suspects Panahi, who told her that his next film would be about a suicide case. While she is emotional, he is sober and rational, and that contrast works perfectly.

Panahi refuses to abandon his art; and if his film meditates about cultural tradition, it also works as a metaphor by targeting those who disregard artistic life, seeing it as a minor craft. He gets everything under control with his camera, which, observing quietly, inflicts a decent low-key treatment in a peculiar road movie marked by slightly intriguing moments. Who told you this wasn't the truth?

The Salesman (2016)

Directed by Asghar Farhadi
Country: Iran / France

Asghar Farhadi, an Iranian writer-director with a knack for profound dramas (“About Elly”, “A Separation”, “The Past”), returns with “The Salesman”, another heartfelt story branded with uncomfortable dualities. The nature of this tale, set and shot in Tehran, will make you ponder about what’s right and wrong, and confront you with a few moral questions that bear on justice, compassion, forgiveness, and retaliation.

Emad (Shahab Hosseini) is a well-liked teacher who shares a huge passion for theater with his wife, Rana (Taraneh Alidoosti). They star in Arthur Miller’s play “Death of a Salesman”, putting every drop of inspiration on their roles. Even in the play, they are husband and wife, impersonating Willy and Linda Loman.
The building where they live is about to collapse due to adjacent construction and structural deficiencies, forcing them to an immediate evacuation. With no place to go, they accept the help of a fellow actor, Babak (Babak Karimi), who finds them an apartment that just got unoccupied. The woman who lived there before had a bad reputation. She left all her belongings in the apartment due to some last-minute difficulties.

One night, while Rana was bathing, someone rings the buzz. Convinced it was Emad, who had left minutes before to go to the neighboring supermarket, she opens the door and returns to the bathroom. To her surprise, she’s violently assaulted by a stranger who, on the run, left a pair of socks on the floor, some money, and his car keys in the apartment.
Rana was taken to the hospital, returning emotionally debilitated, yet unwilling to report the case to the police. Not even the theater seems to help her to overcome the situation. However, little by little, she starts giving signs of recovery.

In turn, for better and for worse, Emad keeps trying to identify the offender through the pickup he left outside, elaborating a plan to have his revenge.
The final part brings revelations and resolutions that lead to a whirlwind of internal conflicts and emotions.

As habitual, Farhadi settles on a ferocious realism conveyed through a credible acting, intelligent narrative simplicity, and mordant irony. He became a true master in this nuanced passive-aggressive style.
The performances of Hosseini and Alidoosti, Farhadi’s frequent and reliable choices, are irreproachable as they were in previous works.
“The Salesman” might not be as striking as “The Separation”, since it’s a slightly more manipulative, but is a powerful piece of cinema that authenticates Farhadi as the most predominant contemporary Iranian filmmaker.

Fireworks Wednesday (2016)

Directed by Asghar Farhadi
Country: Iran

Originally dated from 2006, “Fireworks Wednesday”, is a not-so-known major accomplishment from the celebrated filmmaker, Asghar Farhadi, one of the most acclaimed voices of the Iranian cinema. The Film Forum in New York recently retrieved his third feature, which was already revealing the filmmaker’s keen propensity for realism, as well as his capacity to devise potent family dramas that never feel vulgar and instantly occupy your eyes and mind with its deeply eloquent and susceptible environments.
The film, set in the contemporary Tehran on the Persian New Year, is an honest examination of marriage and infidelity in the very particular society where it takes place.

The central character is Rouhi (Taraneh Alidoosti), a young woman who works for a cleaning agency and is about to get married to a man who’s crazy for her.
One day she’s assigned to clean the apartment of a married couple that is living an intractable marital crisis. The constant arguments between Mojdeh (Hediyeh Tehrani) and Morteza (Hamid Farokhnezhad) are reflected in their apartment whose windows were broken the night before and where everything is placed upside down. The couple’s son, Amir Ali (Matin Heydarnia), is pretty compelling in showing the affliction derived from the distress of witnessing the state of disaffection that his parents fell into. Gradually, Rouhi starts to understand the anguish of Mojdeh who has reasons to believe that her husband is having an affair with the woman next door, Simin (Pantea Bahram), an independent mother who turned her apartment into a clandestine hair salon.
Confused, Rouhi is caught in the middle of the gossips and, by turns, is used by both wife and husband in their desperate schemes.

I don’t have enough laudable words to describe the magnificent performances, authentic dramatic acting lessons for the ones interested in learning the plainness of the art.
The camerawork is another glorious achievement by Mr. Farhadi who cohesively weaves the little fragments that seamlessly express the whole without wasting one single minute of our time. Every scene is meaningful and is there for a reason, allowing us to apprehend the story effortlessly.

Thoroughly absorbing, “Fireworks Wednesday” is anchored in the truthfulness of many men-women relationships. It's a powerful storytelling put up with brilliancy.

Taxi (2015)

Directed by: Jafar Panahi
Country: Iran

Movie Review: One can wonder how is it possible that the Iranian filmmaker Jafar Panahi, who was sentenced by the authoritarian regime of his country to 20 years without making cinema, still manages to direct clandestine masterpieces with a disarming simplicity, emotional truthfulness, social-political awareness, and delightfully humorous situations. Well, my theory is the following: if you really love what you do and have something to say, there’s nothing that can stop you. After his professional banishment, Panahi has directed critically acclaimed films that mix reality and fiction, thoroughly mirroring what he was experiencing at each of those well-defined time slots of his existence. If “This is Not a Film” was a raw documentary that aimed to denounce the humiliating deprivations he was subjected to, “Close Curtain” introduced a lot more fictional elements to build up an imaginative plot. These two films were made when he was under house arrest. In his latest, “Taxi”, the most direct, enjoyable, and accessible documentary-like film from the currently censored phase, Panahi leaves home to show us a factual slice of today’s Tehran. He pretends to be a taxi driver who calmly rides throughout the city, interacting with a variety of passengers (real or fictional) in engrossing situations that tell us much about what his people think and how they feel, (re)act, and live. Not a single passenger is futile and the set fits perfectly the filmmaker’s intentions. Among them, we have a short man who illegally sells foreign movies, a wounded man who wants to change his will before dying, two superstitious ladies carrying a fish bowl, Panahi’s talkative niece who’s trying to make a ‘screenable’ short film for school, a conversation with a desolated childhood friend, and a fortuitous encounter with the affable ‘flower lady’ - another victim of the censorship. With an approach that is similar to Kiarostami’s “Ten” and a few references to Panahi’s old films, the unmissable “Taxi” is one of those cinematic wonders you want to prolong. Mr. Panahi’s only sin was not having more characters to ride – maybe because at the end some motorcyclist broke into his taxi. After this movie, I wouldn’t be surprised if, once again, he was considered a serious threat to the Iran’s security and banned from driving in the country.

Closed Curtain (2013)

Directed by: Jafar Panahi
Country: Iran

Movie Review: Simple in execution, sometimes baffling, but hard to forget, “Closed Curtain” is a valid representation of Jafar Panahi’s current inner state. Banned from filmmaking for 20 years, he is left to his own ghosts and frustrations, and even the words of encouragement from his friendly neighbors don’t always make him feel better. The film starts with a long shot through a window, showing the arrival of the first character, a writer who tries to pull out his creative side. He just wants to be in the company of his dog, which he hides from outside persecutors, since the dogs were considered unclean by some ‘unclean’ governmental law. With all the curtains shut, the quietness felt will be altered by the arrival of a suicidal, yet fearless young woman who is also running from the authorities for having participated in an illegal party. She’s the one who tries to open the curtains and rebel against this overwhelming lack of freedom and injustice. Obviously these two characters came out from Panahi himself, representing his inner battles, and gaining a very personal direction whose message is more than evident. Not so immediate as “This Is Not a Film”, "Closed Curtain" still demonstrates that Panahi can be inventive even with few resources available and surrounded by walls. Writer/director Kambuzia Partovi, who had been inactive since 2005, also co-directs and stars. The film was considered best screenplay in the last Berlin Film Festival.

Manuscripts Don't Burn (2013)

Directed by: Mohammad Rasoulof
Country: Iran

Movie Review: Everybody knows what’s happening to the movies coming from Iran, an authoritarian regime that imposes a tight censorship to the media. Mohammad Rasoulof is one of those persecuted filmmakers whose six films were never exhibited in his country of origin. By watching his latest film, “Manuscripts Don’t Burn”, we understand why the Iranian authorities were so concerned about the film and why Rasoulof was arrested in 2010 along with Jafar Panahi, another acclaimed director who refuses to shut his mouth. The film adopts a relentless narrative to tell the story of two men hired by the government with the mission of killing a writer without leaving marks. Furthermore, they have to do whatever is needed to take possession of a compromising manuscript and all its copies. The unstable but methodical ways used by the killers conditioned somehow the pace of the film, which takes its time to show how these illegal operations are carried out. The most interesting thing is to realize the motives of one of the killers who only thinks in earning some money for his sick kid. More political than entertaining, “Manuscripts Don’t Burn” is hard to watch and won’t be everyone’s cup of tea, but its socio-political denunciations are extremely important to let the world know how these regimes of fear operate in the shadow. Rasoulof assumes a straightforward direction, revealing harsh realities instead of trying to thrill us. For obvious reasons, the cast and crew refused to have their names exhibited in the final credits.

Rhino Season (2012)

Directed by: Bahman Ghobadi
Country: Iran/Turkey

Review: Bahman Ghobadi went to Turkey to shoot “Rhino Season”, an introspective political thriller with lyrical tones and a very particular pace. 30 years ago, during the Iranian Revolution, Sahel Farzan, a Kurdish-Iranian poet was arrested due to his harmless non-political book entitled “Rhino’s Last Poetry”. His wife’s driver, who was in love with her, made a false accusation driven by envy. Released from prison, Farzan departs to Istambul to search for his wife who believes he has been dead for 20 years. Direction and photography are sublime in this story replete of metaphors. The end is open to multiple interpretations, but it’s clear that Ghobadi wants to show that Iran’s regime is drowning the creativity of its own artists and with that, is also sinking itself. There is no other alternative than to leave a country more and more intolerant to self-expression and parched in its ideas. “Rhino Season” is tragic and evinces a deep sadness and pain... a tough reality for all the oppressed Iranian artists.

Modest Reception (2012)

Directed by: Mani Haghighi
Country: Iran

Review: “Modest Reception” has a turbulent starting. The frenetic jazz heard at the opening credits, soon gives place to an effusive scene involving a strange couple and a checkpoint soldier. This couple simply decided to make a trip to a mountain region and deliver bags full of money to random people. Without knowing their motives or intentions, we just follow the reactions to this unlikely offer. Some people are completely indifferent; others are greedy; some others act suspicious, having to be persuaded to accept the money. Although obscure, the story provokes us somehow. The couple’s behavior denotes some madness, since they seem to enjoy what they’re doing but at the same time can’t hide an enraged personality. Alternating among humor, seriousness and some humiliation, "Modest Reception" simply shows us how unpredictably people behave when confronted with money. A radical experience with an unclear conclusion.

This Is Not A Film (2011)

Directed by: Jafar Panahi
Country: Iran

Plot: This clandestine documentary, smuggled into France in a cake, depicts the day-to-day life of acclaimed director Jafar Panahi during his house arrest.

Quick comment: Panahi is a terrific Iranian director who is being victim of an enormous injustice perpetrated by the government of his country. His scripts were censored and he was condemned to 6 years of prison. Also, for the next 20 years he is not allowed to film or even leave the country. This is a pacific protest, a scream of anger and frustration against this humiliating repression. In the limited space of his home, Panahi just did one more time what he knows best - good and interesting cinema!

Relevant awards: -

Circumstance (2011)

Directed by: Maryam Keshavarz
Country: Iran

Plot: A wealthy Iranian family struggles to contain a teenager's growing sexual rebellion and her brother's dangerous obsession.
Quick comment: Bold plot with a clever direction in this iranian present-day story. We can notice slight glimpses of openness which can’t override with the society’s ultra-conservative ideologies. It will make you think about the consequences of your choices.
Relevant Awards: Best film at Rome Film Fest, Italy; Audience Award at Sundance Film Festival and L.A.Outfest, USA.