Granaz Moussavi

Shot on the streets of Kabul, Granaz Moussavi’s (My Tehran For Sale) outstanding new feature is in the tradition of the great child-centred works of the 1980s when filmmakers such as Kiarostami, Panahi and Amir Naderi (to whom this film is dedicated) were putting Iranian cinema in the forefront of world production. 9-year-old Hewad is an irrepressible, street-smart kid who is energetically working every angle, hustling everything from pomegranate juice to amulets to protection from the evil eye. His real ambition is to be a movie star, and this comes a step closer when he meets an Australian photographer. But in a city where every family has a member who has been “martyred,” the streets are as perilous as they are vivid. Australia’s recent involvement with Afghanistan has been mixed, to say the best. The deeply-felt humanism of this film might just be our most effective contribution to that troubled country.

Marzieh is a young female actress living in Tehran. The authorities ban her theatre work and, like all young people in Iran, she is forced to lead a secret life in order to express herself artistically. At an underground rave, she meets Iranian born Saman, now an Australian citizen, who offers her a way out of her country and the possibility of living without fear.