DC Area Premiere

***Advanced tickets for Thursday, June 19th at 8:45 p.m. have sold out.  Standby tickets will be available at the AFI Silver box office approximately 45 minutes prior to showtime.  Tickets are not guaranteed and will be available on a first-come, first-served basis.*** 

Officially, the “information revolution” has not come to Iran—possessing a satellite dish is illegal. Unofficially, Will Smith is a hot commodity. Whether from Hollywood or Bollywood, foreign media are prohibited under Iran’s Islamic government. With only state-sanctioned Islamic programming permitted, many Iranians gravitate toward “forbidden” Western media because it provides a window to the rest of the world. They are supported by a fast-growing subculture determined to gain access to information and Western media—by any means necessary.

Acclaimed Iranian filmmaker Mohammad Rasoulof draws attention to the growing disparity between what Iranians want and what the Islamic state will allow. He takes us on a labyrinthine journey: an underground technician covertly installs satellite dishes for urban middle-class families; a censored journalist relegated to selling sausages out of a roadside shack secretly hacks internet firewalls; a black market DVD dealer liaises with a clandestine studio that specializes in dubbing American blockbusters into Farsi; a band plays their favorite Western rock songs in a hidden room in an unidentified building.

Through candid interviews, effective montage, and stunning cinematography, Rasoulof offers an intimate, occasionally amusing, and often harrowing look inside the Islamic Republic. Information that floats in the air is vast and invisible—how can state control block the winds of change and human desire for information?

-Sky Sitney