Little is known about Afghanistan, apart from a few
clichés, the word Taliban, and a war which seems never
to have stopped since the Soviet Union and the turning
point reached in 2001. With this film, Sepideh Farsi took up again the documentary format she had started with, and using only one came...

متهمین دایره بیستم
Directed by Hesam Eslami • 2017 • Iran
After having his car stolen, the director meets Ehsan, the leader of an adolescent crime gang that breaks into cars regularly. What forms is a close relationship between the director and the members of the group, following their steps for ...

شهر خاموشان
Directed by Ata Hayati • 2004 • Iran
Contrary to the Westerners who want to prolong their life, for the Orientals and specially the Muslims, death is the beginning of a new life which they embrace.
At least once a week, the people of Tehran go the biggest cemetery in their town (Behes...

وقتِ خوبِ مصائب
Directed by Nasser Saffarian • 2006 • Iran
Tribute documentary by Nasser Saffarian about influential poet and screenwriter Ahmadreza Ahmadi, the leading figure in Iran's New Wave Poetry movement. As Ahmadi provides insights into his life, the importance of knowing himself and his ...

‘A Journey Into Zero Space’ is a triptych at the border between autobiographical fiction and experimental film essay, investigating and re-living archives of the past by reflecting on them and on current events. Montage and self-projection are employed to question the notions of authority, histor...

یک ساعت از یک عمر
Directed by Rakhshan Banietemad • 2015 • Iran
"Eskandar Firouz," the founder of the Department of Environment is known as Iran's father of the environment. A few-hours-long meeting and conversation by three environmental activists with him is an oral history and a quick look at ...

والسی برای تهران
Directed by Zeinab Tabrizi • 2016 • Iran
Mehrdad Mehdi, one of the pioneers of street music in Iran, decides to get his old band members together to start a street music festival in Tehran. There are lots of obstacles and difficulties on this road which makes for a heartfelt and ...

زنی که نام ندارد
Directed by Farzad Khoshdast • 2018 • Iran
Behind the solid concrete walls of the women's prison Gharchak in Iran's capital, Tehran, four young women open the door to their lives and innermost thoughts. They reveal their downfall into substance abuse and violent crime, which led ...

علی آقا
Directed by Kamran Heidari • 2017 • Iran
Seventy-year-old Ali Aqa’s large, fleshy hands shake as he helps a newborn pigeon chick hatch. His pigeons, which he keeps on the roof of his home, mean everything to him. He calls his favorite white pigeon “sweetheart” and even takes her into his ...

همه درختان من
Directed by Rakhshan Banietemad • 2015 • Iran
Mahlagha Mallah is Iran’s eldest environmental activist and the founder of the first environmental NGO in Iran. Spending a few days in her home and accompanying her in environmental gatherings and activities is an excuse to portray the c...

نسیان
Directed by Shahin Parhami • 2002 • Canada
Amnesia revolves around the improvised monologues of veteran Iranian Actor Shahram Golchin. It is a cinematic composition that weaves director Shahin Parhami’s signature poetic style of writing with image and sound with Golchin’s improvised perform...

حياط خلوت خانه خورشيد
Directed by Rakhshan Banietemad • 2009 • Iran
In the backstreets of one of the poor districts of Tehran, in a very small house, everyday hundreds of women spend a few hours in the shadows of a safe shelter. Women, whose share in life is only suffering and humiliation.

امین
Directed by Shahin Parhami • 2011 • Iran
Amin is the story of an ancient musical tradition and one man’s struggle to preserve it. It is told using a unique approach to documentary storytelling that challenges the boundaries of fiction and reality. Amin Aghaie is a young modern nomad from the...

آمور دو ریل
Directed by Iman Behrouzi • 2017 • Iran
After working abroad for several years, a filmmaker returns to his family home in Shiraz, Iran to make a film for the woman he loves. His exploration of his feelings and of the cross-cultural and geographical barriers to pursuing this relationsh...

اتلان
Directed by Moein Karrimoodini • 2015 • Iran
Ali’s 90-year-old grandfather always told his family, “A Turkman without a horse is not a Turkman”. Following in the family tradition, Ali trains the sturdy creatures for a grand race in a northern Iranian province. His favourite horse, Ilhan, ha...

صدای دوم
Directed by Mojtaba Mirtahmasb • 2004 • Iran
Back Vocal tells the story of women singers, whose unaccompanied singing is forbidden by religious laws of the country, but who nonetheless try to remain active; even if that means taking the second seat. I knew from the beginning that such a ...

بسیجی
Directed by Mehran Tamadon • 2009 • Iran
In a desert, on a hill, men and women in chadors and children wander through a vast open air "museum" dedicated to the memory of the martyrs of the Iran-Iraq war. It is Iranian New Year and we are close to the Iraqi border. I'm following my guide. He...

قبل از انقلاب
Directed by Dan Shadur • 2013 • Israel
Today they may be sworn enemies, but in the 60s and 70s thousands of Israelis lived in Iran. Protected by arms deals and complex financial ties, the Israelis enjoyed a luxurious lifestyle, wilfully blind to the corruption they supported. But in...

In the Islamic Republic of Iran, a country with strict social mores and traditional values, sex-change operations are legal. Over twenty years ago, Ayatollah Khomeini issued a fatwa (religious edict) making sex change permissible for “diagnosed transsexuals.” Yet homosexuality is still punishable...

فالگوش
Directed by Mohammadreza Farzad • 2012 • Iran
In 1978, on the verge of the revolution, more than 130 cinemas burned down across Iran, including 28 in Tehran. Who set them on fire, how was it done, and why?