Institute of Contemporary Arts

Kandahar

Kandahar, Dir Mohsen Makhmalbaf, Iran 2001

Shot on the border of Iran and Afghanistan, Kandahar is a politically urgent story of a young female journalist named Nafas who escaped Afghanistan. Nafas receives a letter from her sister announcing that she's decided to commit suicide during the final eclipse before the dawn of the 21st century; desperate to spare her sister's life, Nafas makes haste to Afghanistan, where she joins a caravan of refugees who, for a variety of reasons, are returning to the war-torn nation. As Nafas searches for her sister, she soon gets a clear and disturbing portrait of the toll the Taliban regime has taken upon its people.

Certificate: PG  

Key cast / credits: Dir: Mohsen Makhmalbaf

Starring Niloufar Pazira

Running time: 85 mins

Release date: November 2001 (UK)

Country: Iran / France

Language: Persian / English / Pashtu / Polish w/English Subtitles

Format available: 35mm/digi

"Kandahar is a polished, sumptuously photographed indictment of conditions [in Afganistan]. " Sheila Johnston, Screen International

"Mohsen Makhmalbaf's beautiful, pure film, as finely tuned as the strings of a forbidden violin, is a vibrant plea which cries out like an appeal for help.  A plea for women, condemned to the window of their burkas, the Afghan dress, this cotton prison, this citadel of all solitude."    Oliver Weber, journalist and author

"Mohsen Makhmalbaf's anti-Taliban polemic... was one of the angriest films at Cannes [2001]." The Observer