Rakhshan Bani-Etemad, Iran’s premier woman director, and long-time collaborator Mohsen Abdolvahab condemn the horrors of war in a new film that is as emotionally intense as it is timely. In 1988, peasant widow Gilaneh (Fatemeh Motamed Arya) sees her son Ismaeel drafted into the Iran-Iraq War as her pregnant daughter is set to travel to Tehran to find her husband, an army deserter. The film’s second half jumps ahead 15 years later: Gilaneh is now caring for the bedridden Ismaeel -- a war veteran ravaged by chemical weapons -- as the United States begins its assault on Baghdad…

Screening organized with the collaboration of the UCLA Film and Television Archive in conjunction with The 16th Annual Celebration of Iranian Cinema (Jan 13–Feb 12). See cinema.ucla.edu for more information about the festival.

Read the press release