Mahmoudi brothers, Iran-Afghan cinema link

The Iranian award-winning filmmakers, Navid and Jamshid Mahmoudi, have been acting as a link between Iranian and Afghan cinemas.

During the past few years they have produced many joint productions with the Afghan cinema; successful films that have outshined other movies at various international film festivals.

The Mahmoudi brothers’ flicks mostly focus on the social and psychological challenges Afghan families, boys and girls face outside their homeland.

‘Dying in Holy Water’, ‘A Few Cubic Meters of Love’, ‘Parting’, ‘Rona, Azim’s Mother’ and their most recent international success ‘7.5’ are a number of their bright productions so far.

The filmmaking duo’s latest production ‘7.5’ has so far been screened in many international film festivals.

‘Parting’ chronicles the story of two young Afghans in love, Fereshteh and Nabi. Fereshteh has to follow her parents and leave Afghanistan to find refuge in Iran. The love story fluctuates among reaching and separation.

‘7.5’ tells the story of seven Afghan and Iranian women in seven episodes in the form of a sequence shot. While all of the women are getting married on the same Friday night, each of them is dealing with certain issues.

‘Dying in Holy Water’ is about some young Afghans who go from Iran to Europe.

‘A Few Cubic Meters of Love’ narrates the story of an Afghan immigrant man whose daughter falls in love with a boy named Saber. When the father and daughter are to leave Iran, finally Saber finds the guts to talk about his love, but faces fierce disagreement of the father. The two, face frightful events afterwards.

‘Rona, Azim’s Mother’ is the story of an Afghan refugee named Azim who lives in Tehran along with his family and works at Tehran municipality at night. Being the family’s head, he must choose between his own life and his mother’s whom he claims is the most important one in his life, as he found out that she is in dire need of kidney transplant.

FM/FM