The Orion

Colour, DV Cam
Iran, 2010, 78 min
WP - World Premiere
Section: Forum of Independents

About the film

A student named Elham falls in love with likable Amir and loses her virginity. But her lover doesn’t intend to marry her and so Elham finds herself in a desperate situation. When it comes out that the girl is no longer a virgin, she and her former boyfriend end up in court. Under such pressure, Amir quickly changes from an understanding friend into a pragmatist: he pushes his ex-lover to change her testimony and deny that it was he who dishonored her. According to tradition, there is only one way Elham’s father can solve her unfortunate situation. Director Zamani Esmati cogently spells out the hopeless position of an intelligent, educated woman in a traditionally-structured Muslim society. Behind the compelling minimalist visuals of his psychological drama, shot in the best tradition of Iranian cinema, the filmmaker questions what kind of society considers Elham’s tragic story acceptable. Renowned director and screenwriter Jafar Panahi contributed to this film as an editing consultant.

About the director

Zamani Esmati (b. 1973, Yazd, Iran) took a bachelor’s degree as a surveying engineer but an interest in film changed the direction of his career. In 1996 he shot his first 8mm short, and since then his movies, primarily documentaries, have gained attention at home and abroad (e.g. An Unfinished Story / Yek dastane natamam, 2000, and The Good Soil / Khake khoub, 2002). He made his first feature in 2004, Narrow Alleys (Kochehaye barik, 2004), the story of two brothers who find a tape player with the recorded voice of a dead man,  however, the film encountered problems with Iranian censorship. The psychological drama The Orion is his second feature project.