The Circle

On April 19^th the screening of "The Circle" by Jafar Panahi was organized in Civil Society Institute office.

The film won several international awards, including the Golden Lion at the Venice Film Festival in 2000, but it is banned in Iran. 

The film does not have a central protagonist: instead, it is constructed around a sequence of short interconnecting stories. Each story intersects, but none is complete, leaving the viewer to imagine both the background and the ending.

Throughout the movie, Panahi focuses on the little rules symbolizing difficulties of life for Iranian women, such as the need to wear a chador under certain circumstances, or not being allowed to travel alone. He frequently uses contrast to illustrate both happiness and misery in contemporary Tehran: for example, a marriage party, symbolizing a happy ending, takes place in the background while a young girl is abandoned.