List on Loan at Study Center

These summaries are not mine. I have collected them from various sources on Internet. They are listed solely for the purpose of class assignment.

ARTICLE 61

Fakhteh escaped from the man who had held her captive for two weeks, but the man did not survive the blow she dealt him. Article 61 of the Islamic criminal code states: "If, whilst defending one's life, honour, chastity, property or freedom against any immediate or imminent aggression, one makes an action which is an offence […] one will not be prosecuted and punished." In the Iranian courts, this rule is applicable, but is not always applied. In Article 61, we get acquainted with a number of women who, to protect themselves or their children, committed a murder. Despite the fact that none of them wittingly killed her attacker, these women were sentenced quid pro quo by the court - an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth. Candidly, the women tell about their lives and the tragic events that landed them in jail. The lack of legal aid and the impossibility of further appeal put them in a dead-end situation. Once in a while, a letter from a desperate daughter or interference by an international human rights organisation manages to postpone an execution or have a woman released. But these are exceptions. The Evin Prison in Tehran buzzes with stories of women vainly hoping for protection by virtue of Article 61. 

THE LADIES ROOM [ZANANEH]
Directed by the acclaimed Iranian actress Mahnaz Afzali and filmed entirely inside a ladies washroom in a public park in Tehran, this absorbing documentary shatters Western preconceptions of Iranian women. Populated by addicts, prostitutes, runaway girls and others who simply enjoy the camaraderie and atmosphere, the ladies room becomes one of the few places where women feel comfortable enough to smoke cigarettes, discuss taboo subjects and remove their veils. In a series of frank and intimate conversations, these diverse women debate everything from drugs and family abuse, to sex, relationships and religion. Maryam is an epileptic who reveals the brutal circumstances that drove her to heroin addiction and self-mutilation; Sepideh describes her fraught relationship with her mother and her struggle to get back on her feet; and the old woman who runs the bathroom alternately offers tough love and a shoulder to cry on. Raw and provocative, this engrossing film is a remarkable verite look at the hidden lives of Iranian women.

MAHIN

MAHIN is a girl who was shocked during bombing Tehran (Iran-Iraq war), she is a psychopath now. This film is about her life and her family.

THE MAYLADY

Frough, a 42-year-old single mother and a documentary film-maker is successful in her film career, but faces problems in her private life. She is divorced and thinking about starting a new relationship with Dr Rahbar, a widowed man living with his daughter. But Forough’s teenage son Mani is reluctant to accept his mum’s relationship with another man in the absence of his father. This results in a covert war of nerves between mother and son. Forough’s life changes drastically when she meets Dr Rahbar. He proposes to her to get married but she finds it hard to accept.
In the meantime Frough’s latest commission is to make a documentary film on ‘the ideal mother’. She surrounds herself with videotapes on which women talk about the social problems they experience, such as the painful consequences of the war with Iraq. Meanwhile, her son is put in jail for being in a birthday party and fighting a basiji (a member of Iran’s paramilitary force) and she tries to set him free. The differences with Frough’s feelings become painfully apparent. While making the film, she experiences an upheaval and overcomes her hesitation about marrying Dr Rahbar.

MAYBE ANOTHER TIME

While editing a documentary film on air pollution, Modabber, a TV commentator, finds his wife, Kian, seemingly engaged in a pleasant conversation with a man in a car. He becomes suspicious of his wife’s behavior. Meanwhile Kian is suffering from anxiety and illusion caused by an identity crisis. This is a masterpiece of a suspense film in which psychoanalytical elements as well as the concept of identity crisis in modern society are interwoven.

MURDERER OR MURDERED

This documentary was the initial project from which ARTICLE 61 emerged.

NARGES

A sharp-edged look at people who live outside the constraints of Islamic law. In her fourth feature, director Rakhshan Bani-Etemad tells the tragic story of a love triangle. Afagh, an aging thief who has lost her beauty, is on the verge of losing her young lover, Adel. When Adel meets the beautiful Nargess, he decides to go straight, but honest work does not come easily, and he decides to go back to the old life for one last job.

NOSE IRANIAN STYLE

In 20 years, nose jobs in Iran have gone from 10,000 per year to 60,000 or 70,000. This film asks why. Oskouei talks to high school students, women, men, doctors, nurses, clerics, actors, scholars, and a filmmaker about why they think Iran is the "nose job capital of the world." People have them to attract a mate, to reduce teasing, to gain self-confidence, or to get ahead at work. Some reject it as just fashion or superficial. A filmmaker describes the difficulty of casting historical films because all the actresses have nose jobs. Clerics lament the decline of values and leadership. A post-operative youth groans. Doctors discuss their fees. Polka dots and moonbeams.

SALAM CINEMA

Makhmalbaf puts an advertisement in the papers calling for an open casting for his next movie. However when hundreds of people show up, he decides to make a movie about the casting and the screen tests of the would-be actors.

SOS IN TEHRAN
Sou Abadi spent five months in Tehran filming in institutions: The Voice of Assistance is a psychology telephone hotline, The Committee of Imam is a charity created by the Ayatollah Khomeini for the poor, The mandatory pre-marital sex education courses of the Health Ministry, the group psychotherapy sessions of Dr. Majd, psychoanalyst of Tehran's elite, The Marriage Foundation, an ultra-Islamic matrimonial agency. 

THE STORY OF THE LAND ON ASHES

Along with demolition of Afghanistan by Taliban Forces and invasion of US army, there are vast immigration of people and emotional collapse of Afghani women.

THROUGH BURKA listed as THE OTHER SIDE OF BURKA

On the southern Iranian island of Qeshm in the Persian Gulf, the women must wear a headscarf, but also a special type of “burka,” a pinching mask of black bands pressing against the eyebrows and nose, and ending in a point just above the mouth. Against strict religious rules, these women talk openly in this film about their physical and emotional suffering. “We never wanted to appear before a camera, but now we do,” one woman proclaims, “we may wear a burka, but we are human beings. We breathe and live.” Appearing before a camera, before an audience, is their only chance for escape. Their only other option, which occurs frequently on the island, is suicide. The film, in fact, begins with the funeral of Samireh, a young woman who hanged herself from a fan with her shawl. At the funeral, her grieving husband expresses the following sentiment, “A woman is like a pair of shoes. When one is gone, you can find another one. But what am I supposed to do with the children?”

WHERE DO I BELONG

Afghans, fleeing poverty, war and destitution, illegally resettle in Iran and enter nuptial relationships with Persian women. This occurs even despite inter-marital cultural conflicts and a broader Iranian sociocultural framework not gamely poised to accept interracial romance or marriage. 

ZINAT

The conflict felt by a modern Iranian woman as she is forced to choose between her career and the traditional obligations of a housewife are examined in this drama. Until she married Hamed, Zinat worked in a public health clinic in a small Iranian town. She loved her job and was deeply committed to helping the community. After the wedding, her in-laws and family force her to quit and become a full-time housewife. She does try, but her former patients keep returning for help. Zinat cannot, in good conscience, turn them away so she helps them. She then suffers the wrath of her mother-in-law, but even after the irate in-law locks Zinat in the house, the plucky young woman still continues to help people.