The Familiar Soil

Death surrounds Bahman, a director who hasn't made a film in 24 years (he can't get past the censors). He's working on a documentary, for Japanese TV, on Iranian burial practices. On the anniversary of his wife's death, a hitchhiker tells him a story of spousal abuse and infant mortality, he discovers that someone has been buried in his plot next to his wife, and he needs the help of his attorney, a well-connected fixer. He dreams of death, even as he investigates it for his film. His niece's husband, a well-known writer, fails to return home; he searches hospitals for an unclaimed body. His heart disease is flaring up. Is he prepared for death? Is that all that's left?

Persian Carpet is an omnibus film produced by Iran's National Carpet Center and Farabi Cinema Foundation where 15 renowned Iranian directors contributed films on the subject of Persian carpet. Carpets are the reflection of the cultural and historical identity of Iran.

Prince Ehtejab, one of the last remaining heirs of the Qajar royal family, is suffering from tuberculosis, which he knows is fatal. He spends his last days alone in the magnificent rooms of his wintry palace, from where he recollects the glory days of his ancestors as well as days of degradation. Among the latter are the gruesome manner in which his cruel grandfather murdered his mother and brother, and the way that he himself caused the death of his wife.

Two old writers who one of them is returned to Iran after 38 years because of his son's suicide, are going on a trip to the grave of that son.

Director Bahman Farmanara's second film following a 20-year exile from his native Iran depicts the spiritual crisis of a middle-aged man. In the film's dreamlike opening scene, Dr. Reza Sepidbakht (Reza Kianian), a well-off Tehran gynecologist, thinks he runs over an angel while driving home at night with a call girl. The next morning at the hospital where he works, he is shown a comatose boy who is famous for having memorized the entire Koran. These two events cause him to rethink his cynical outlook on life and his relationships with his elderly father, wayward son, and the women he has mistreated since becoming estranged from his wife. When the boy awakens from his coma, Dr. Sepidbakht begins to look to him for answers.

Taher Mohebi is a well-known writer who, after witnessing a violent murder, breaks down and spends three years in a mental institution. After release he is told that things are just as they were before, but his relentless hallucinations make him want to return to the institution.

Based on a short story by Houshang Golshiri, who also collaborated with director Bahman Farmanara on his breakout feature Prince Ehtejab (1974), this film centers on mysterious and chilling events that take place in a village. A group of superstitious inhabitants have erected a scarecrow for protection but soon find themselves terrorized by it. Made at the end of the Shah’s reign, the film offers a metaphorical reflection on power relations — how people create their own idols who turn around to terrorize them. The film’s alleged political message was found so dangerous that it was banned both pre- and post-revolution. It was presented to great acclaim in Cannes Film Festival’s Critics' Week section.

Bahram Farzaneh is a writer who has long been unable to write a story. Suddenly, due to a car accident, a song is repeated in his mind that brings him to dance. The same thing stirred up the passion for writing.

Mr. Namdar is an artist who lives by himself alone in a remote village peacefully. But when his niece comes from the city to the village to visit him his life changes radically and for ever.