Actor: Behnaz Jafari

3 Faces

Filmmaker Jafar Panahi and actor Behnaz Jafari travel to a tiny village after receiving a plea for help from a girl whose family has forbidden her from studying acting. Amusing encounters abound, but they soon discover that the local hospitality is rivaled by the desire to protect old traditions.

Blackboards

Itinerant Kurdish teachers, carrying blackboards on their backs, look for students in the hills and villages of Iran, near the Iraqi border during the Iran-Iraq war. Said falls in with a group of old men looking for their bombed-out village; he offers to guide them, and takes as his wife Halaleh, the clan's lone woman, a widow with a young son. Reeboir attaches himself to a dozen pre-teen boys weighed down by contraband they carry across the border; they're mules, always on the move. Said and Reeboir try to teach as their potential students keep walking. Danger is close; armed soldiers patrol the skies, the roads, and the border. Is there a role for a teacher? Is there hope?

Shirin

A hundred and fourteen famous Iranian theater and cinema actresses and a French star: mute spectators at a theatrical representation of Khosrow and Shirin, a Persian poem from the twelfth century, put on stage by Kiarostami. The development of the text -- long a favorite in Persia and the Middle East -- remains invisible to the viewer of the film, the whole story is told by the faces of the women watching the show.

Yalda

Maryam accidentally killed her husband Nasser and is sentenced to death. The only person who can save her is Mona, Nasser's daughter. All Mona has to do is appear on a TV show and forgive Maryam. But forgiveness proves difficult when they are forced to relive the past.

Terrestrial Verses

A satirical take on the mundane absurdities of life in modern-day Iran, these nine vignettes illuminate the lighter side of enduring under authoritarian rule. Whether choosing a name for a newborn, graduating from grade school, getting a driver’s license, applying for a job, or seeking approval for a film script, if you live in Iran, you best come fluent in Orwellian discourse. Progressing along a rough timeline from birth to death, each story is shot in a static camera angle as a single petitioner negotiates with an authority figure hovering just outside of frame, who is practiced in the language of doublespeak.

The Girl's House

Tomorrow is Samira's wedding ceremony and Bahar and Parisa are shopping excitedly. But at night somebody calls and tells them that the bride is dead and the wedding has been called off. They are both shocked and they cannot believe what they have heard, so they go straight to their friend's fiancé, Mansoor, to find out about the cause of her suspicious death.

Sound and Fury

Khosro, a pop singer, lives a hectic life with his wife Tina and their son Moez. His life is further complicated when he begins a love affair with a female fan. A terrible event ensues obliging the lovers to each recount their side of the story in pursuit of the truth.

Patio

Patio is the story of individuals whose city, no matter how large it may be, feels similar to a small patio for them.

The Southside Pickpocket

A thief comes out of prison and begins searching for his sister. Along the way, he meets another thief, a girl, they work together to gather money, but things don't go well.

A House Built on Water

Director Bahman Farmanara's second film following a 20-year exile from his native Iran depicts the spiritual crisis of a middle-aged man. In the film's dreamlike opening scene, Dr. Reza Sepidbakht (Reza Kianian), a well-off Tehran gynecologist, thinks he runs over an angel while driving home at night with a call girl. The next morning at the hospital where he works, he is shown a comatose boy who is famous for having memorized the entire Koran. These two events cause him to rethink his cynical outlook on life and his relationships with his elderly father, wayward son, and the women he has mistreated since becoming estranged from his wife. When the boy awakens from his coma, Dr. Sepidbakht begins to look to him for answers.