| Details | Available in DC, Maryland, and Virginia from January 22–February 7 Stream it here: https://iranfestdc.eventive.org Trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HgyisKVoFzY The winner of the Golden Bear at the 2020 Berlin International Film Festival, this profoundly humanist film from Mohammad Rasoulof takes on the issue of capital punishment through four powerful vignettes dramatizing the social, psychological, and emotional toll of taking a human life. After an introductory segment that chillingly illustrates the banality of evil, the next three stories examine Iran’s policy of forcing conscripted soldiers to carry out executions. In one, a young soldier tries desperately to avoid this gruesome duty. In another, a soldier who has had to perform executions visits his fiancée’s family, only to discover a shocking truth. And in the final section, a former doctor must reveal to his niece the family secret that made him abandon his career. Rasoulof’s commitment to social and moral justice in films such as this, as well as A Man of Integrity and Manuscripts Don’t Burn, resulted in a one-year prison sentence for “propaganda against the system,” handed down in March 2020, though he has refused to turn himself in. (Dir.: Mohammad Rasoulof, Germany/Czech Republic/Iran, 2020, 150 min., Persian with English subtitles)
Images courtesy of Kino Lorber |
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