Just days after he finished shooting his latest film, The Seed of The Sacred Fig, Mohammad Rasoulof got a call that would change the course of his life.
Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Court had just sentenced him to eight years in prison over charges linked to his earlier films and activism. It was the latest, and harshest, in a series of arrests and jail time over the past 15 years. There was no possibility of appeal.
Security forces had yet to learn of the new film, which was shot in secret without required government authorization.
"That's when I saw no other way but leaving the country," Rasoulof told NPR's Leila Fadel during a recent visit to New York, part of travels that have taken him across the world to promote what is assuredly his most daring film.
Earlier this year, Rasoulof traveled on foot over Iran's rugged mountains for a grueling 28-day journey that eventually landed him in Germany, and then onwards to the Cannes Film Festival in France for the film's premiere.
The director says he desperately tried to continue living in Iran to create the kind of work he wanted to make, "which meant living under constant fear, pressure and with a great deal of tension."
But with a lengthy prison sentence and further anticipated retaliation over the new film looming, "it became apparent to me that the the only role I could play while in prison was the role of the victim of censorship... And I don't like playing the role of the victim," he added, speaking through his interpreter, Iante Roach.
The story of his film centers around a family of four in Tehran that grows increasingly divided over the daughters' support for the Woman, Life, Freedom movement sparked by the death of Mahsa Amini in police custody in 2022. She was known by her Kurdish name Jina and was arrested for not wearing her headscarf properly.
Rasoulof was in jail at the time and the protests had largely died down by the time he was released in February 2023. Re-creating for his film scenes involving the street protests would have triggered immediate scrutiny from Iran's security forces. So Rasoulof incorporated footage shot by ordinary people during the actual protests.
"These videos were truly shocking, at least in two ways. On the one hand, they showed you what oppressive and savage regime is ruling the country," he said. "And on the other hand, they showed you this incredibly courageous young generation that knows how to express its wants."
The father in the story, Iman (Missagh Zareh), is promoted as an investigator in the Islamic Revolutionary Court and his wife, Najmeh, (Soheila Golestani) tries to keep the family unified.
Najmeh advises her daughters to now be "irreproachable" to avoid any possible retaliation. "You must watch your attitude, your clothes, the places you go, your friends, your words," she warns.
Rasoulof says he was inspired by a chance encounter with a high-ranking prison official while in detention. The man "told me in secret that he hated himself, he was thinking of taking his life, and that his children kept questioning him very harshly about his job," Rasoulof recalled. "And that's where I thought it would be very interesting to tell the story of a family that has a rift of that kind."
It was also thanks to people he met in prison that Rasoulof was ultimate able to leave the country. They told him of safe routes he could take out of Iran. "The path to freedom passed through prison," he said. The younger actresses also managed to leave the country, but not Zareh and Golestani, along with other members of the cast and crew.
At Cannes in May, the film received a 12-minute standing ovation. When he walked out on the red carpet, Rasoulof pulled out of his jacket pictures of Zareh and Golestani.
The cast and crew's passports were confiscated and those involved in the film have also been accused in court proceedings of spreading corruption, prostitution, antigovernment propaganda and conspiracy against national security, according to Rasoulof. In recent days, Golestani has faced multiple interrogations and intense pressure.
"The regime is paranoid about other filmmakers making underground films in a similar vein, and so they probably want to use our cast and crew and make examples out of them in order to dissuade anyone who wants to do a similar project in the future inside Iran," Rasoulof said.
He acknowledged that his film owed much to the women who collaborated with him, especially the actresses. "Their courage and resilience was the most inspiring and the most enabling aspect of the entire project," he said. "They were the ones who always gave me the confidence and the courage and gave us all the courage and desire to keep going."
He said that Setareh Maleki, who plays the younger daughter, Sana, was very clear when first approached about the film that she'd refuse to participate if she had to wear the veil. She does wear the veil in some of the film's scenes, but these are set in public places, where the veil is compulsory in Iran. Since the 1979 Islamic Revolution, women are also forbidden from appearing on screen without a full hijab.
"For me, the most important question was always what matters the most to you? Is it filmmaking or is it freedom, integrity, self-respect, dignity? And I think it's the latter," Rasoulof said. "I want freedom. I don't want to make films at any costs. I don't want to make films that comply with censorship."
The broadcast version was produced by Mansee Khurana. The digital version was edited by Obed Manuel.
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