LIDF

THREE SHORT FILMS ON IRAN (69min)
Venue: The British Museum – BP Theatre

World Première
Tehran Backyard (Hayat Khalvat e Tehran)
Director: Roxana Pope, 2007, Scottish, 28min

Pari lives on the outskirts of Tehran. Each day she travels over six hours into the sprawling city to work as a cleaning lady. Her husband is blind, she has five children and two grandchildren and at 65-years-old is still the main breadwinner for her family. Set against the backdrop of major demonstrations in Tehran over the countries right to have nuclear power and celebrations marking the 28th anniversary of the Islamic Revolution. An intimate portrait of an extraordinary woman.

UK Première
Cyanosis (Sianoze)
Director: Rokhsareh Ghaemmaghami, 2007, Iran, 32min

Jamshid Aminfar is a painter, forced to work on the streets of Iran but determined to pursue the art he loves despite constant interruption and hassle from officials and the public. With the help of his friends he prepares for an exhibition. Without the help of his friends he falls in love.

This film contains some animation sequences.

UK Première
Feminin Masculin
Director: Sadaf Foroughi, 2007, Iran, 9min

Like many things in Iran, bus travel is segregated: women must enter at the back of the bus and sit in a small area, away from the men, who enter at the front of the vehicle. But not in Farahnaz Shiri’s bus. Shiri is the first female bus-driver in Tehran, and on her bus everything is deliberately organised the other way around: women get on at the front, while men, however much they protest, must get on at the back and sit in the small zone normally reserved for women.

An unconventional woman dealing with the consequences of challenging gender stereotypes in modern Iran.

This is one of a series of films made for Why Democracy?, a documentary project using film to start a global conversation about democracy. For more information see www.whydemocracy.net

TICKETS
£3.00 from The British Museum Box office
Tel: 0207 323 8181
www.britishmuseum.org