Tales

Award-winning Iranian filmmaker Rakshan Banietemad ends her eight-year hiatus from feature filmmaking with this ingenious, mosaic-like narrative, which knits together the stories of seven characters to create a microcosm of Iranian working-class society.

House of Sand and Fog

Behrani, an Iranian immigrant buys a California bungalow, thinking he can fix it up, sell it again, and make enough money to send his son to college. However, the house is the legal property of former drug addict Kathy. After losing the house in an unfair legal dispute with the county, she is left with nowhere to go. Wanting her house back, she hires a lawyer and befriends a police officer. Neither Kathy nor Behrani have broken the law, so they find themselves involved in a difficult moral dilemma.

Mainline

The uneasy relationship between a mother and daughter is made all the more turbulent by drug abuse in this downbeat drama from Iranian filmmakers Rakhshan Bani-Etemad and Mohsen Abdolvahab

Romantic Nostalgia

During a demonstration, with the assistance of a man named Manouchehr, Fereshteh succeeds to get rid of the security forces. After victory of the revolution, they accidentally meet each other and consequently get married despite disagreement of Fereshteh’s family. Coming back from the honeymoon, they are encountered with a new situation altering all the peoples’ lives. The men should go to the war front for defending their country after the invasion of Iraqi Army to Iran.

Women's Prison

Spanning 18 years in an Iranian women's prison, this follows two women: the new prison warden, a tough as nails devout Muslim who has served in the army on the Iraqi front, and a young midwife, Mitra, who is serving her sentence for killing her mother's abusive husband. In the early years, Mitra is repeatedly punished as the warden tries to break her. This includes punishment for delivering a baby in the prison cell while all of the prison staff has taken shelter during an Iraqi bombing. The warden's attitude starts to change after 8 years, when Mitra tries to protect a new inmate from rape at the hands of her older cellmates. When the baby comes back in 1991 as a 17 year old delinquent, Sepideh, the warden respects Mitra enough to protect the girl.

Any Day Now

Bahman, Mahtab, Ramin and Donya Mehdipour are enjoying a perfect summer in a small Finnish town. Their routines are fractured by a negative decision on their application for asylum by the Finnish Immigration Service. But life must go on and the 13-year-old Ramin is about to enter an entirely new school, junior high. The Mehdipours use their last chance to appeal but continue their everyday lives, fuelled by their exceptionally positive outlook and attitude.

Special Line

A hacker group empty a bank account of a big strong person. The story goes on and now they must pay for that.

The New Country

A 15-year-old Somalian boy meets a 40-year-old Iranian man in a refugee camp in Skåne, in the south of Sweden. With the threat of deportation hanging over them, they decide to take their faiths in their own hands and together they go on a journey in the Swedish summer.

Crazy Rook

The story of a young friends who met on the Internet and a fun way to bet on a complex and daunting fall. The path to a new understanding of life and society for Each of them.

No Choice

A young homeless girl supports herself as a surrogate mother for money. A human rights attorney tries to help her change her life, but ithe challenges seem insurmountable. This is a rarely seen side of Iranian society.

Rhino Season

Kurdish-Iranian poet Sahel has just been released from a thirty-year prison sentence in Iran. Now the one thing keeping him going is the thought of finding his wife, who thinks he's been dead for over twenty years.

Gilaneh

A mother's courage, hardship, and love, in times of war. In 1988, during the Iran-Iraq war, Gilane escorts her pregnant daughter, Maygol, from the relative calm of their village, Espili, into war-torn Tehran to search for Maygol's husband, Rahman. The journey is arduous and what they find when they reach the capital is dismaying and frightening. Fifteen years later, as another war begins in Iraq, Gillane is at home caring for her son Ismael, who suffers from epilepsy, a byproduct of war. As she cares for him, she hopes for a visit from the doctor and from another daughter, Atefah. "Better be a dog than a mother," she says.

Elevator

Elevator (Persian: آسانسور‎‎) is a 1995 social drama Iranian film, written and directed by Hossein Shahabi (Persian: حسین شهابی)

Rain Tree

Rain Tree (Persian: درخت بارانی‎‎) is a 2001 Iranian drama film Written and directed by Hossein Shahabi.

Echo

Echo (Persian: پژواك‎‎) is a 1997 Iranian Drama film Written and directed by Hossein Shahabi.

Wars and Treasure

Tunnel 18

Tunnel 18 (Persian: تونل 18‎‎) is a 1997 Iranian Historical drama film written and directed by Hossein Shahabi (Persian: حسین شهابی)

Hafez

A young man named Shamsadin (Mehdi Moradi) receives the title of Hafez, bestowed only on those who memorize the Koran, and is sent to teach it to Nabat (Aso), the overseas-raised daughter of a religious leader. Although they never see each other's faces, feelings of love grow between them as they read the holy book. Unable to contain his feelings for Nabat, Hafez breaks his vows as a holy man by composing a poem to her, and is thrown out of her father's house and forced to relinquish his title. Then Nabat is forced to marry another man. Will the two ever be able to meet again?

Time to Love

Bita (Hatami), a successful lawyer specializing in championing the cause of women’s rights in divorce cases, is blind to the trouble brewing in her own marriage. A snatch of gossip and a problem client with an unwanted pregnancy unexpectedly bring Bita’s problems home. (Gene Siskel Film Center)

Fairy Tale

Is This Thing On?

As their marriage quietly unravels, Alex faces middle age and an impending divorce, seeking new purpose in the New York comedy scene while Tess confronts the sacrifices she made for their family—forcing them to navigate co-parenting, identity, and whether love can take a new form.

¿Y Cómo Es Él?

Thomas is a meek man on the verge of a nervous breakdown. Despite his situation he decides to fake a work trip to go to Vallarta to confront Jero, a taxi driver who is sleeping with his wife.

Dr. Bird's Advice for Sad Poets

In the emotionally charged, wild and humorous world of sixteen year old James Whitman, his struggle to overcome anxiety and depression involve seeking advice from Dr. Bird - a giant imaginary pigeon therapist.

The Beanie Bubble

Ty was a frustrated toy salesman until his collaboration with three women turned his stuffed animals into a defining '90s trend. This behind-the-scenes look at history's biggest toy craze is a wild story about what—and who—is valued in this world.

Somewhere in Queens

Leo and Angela Russo live a simple life in Queens, surrounded by their overbearing Italian-American family. When their son finds success on his high school basketball team, Leo tears the family apart trying to make it happen.

Wicked Little Letters

When the denizens of Littlehampton – including conservative Edith – begin receiving letters full of hilarious profanities, rowdy Irish migrant Rose is charged with the crime. Suspecting something amiss, the town's women band together to investigate.

The Adults

Eric returns home for a short visit and finds himself caught between reuniting with his sisters and chasing a victory with his old poker group. As the trip extends, Eric finds it increasingly difficult to avoid confrontations and revelations as his carefully constructed façade of his adulthood gives way to old childhood conflicts.

The Best You Can

Cynthia Rand is a buttoned-up New Yorker married to a brilliant professor 25 years her senior. She begins feeling the effects of her husband’s advancing age on their relationship, just as her world is turned upside down by the arrival of sharp but chronically underachieving security guard Stan Olszewski in this smart rom-com that reunites Bacon and Sedgwick on screen for the first time in 20 years.

Hostile Takeover

Follows Pete, a professional hitman, as he faces a group of assassins after the boss of a crime syndicate suspects disloyalty due to his attendance at Workaholics Anonymous meetings.

Hooking Up

Bailey and Darla embark upon a misguided and mutually deceitful form of therapy, one in which they must drive across the country, re-enacting Darla's colorful history as a sex addict. As their true motivations for the road trip come to light, the unlikely pair force one another to confront their issues, discovering that there might actually be more to love than just sex.

What's Love Got to Do with It?

Two childhood friends now in their thirties must decide whether to follow their heads or their hearts once the man decides to follow his parents' advice and enter into an arranged marriage in Pakistan.

A California Christmas: City Lights

Follows Callie and Joseph one year after they fell in love, now running a dairy farm and winery, but their romance is threatened when business and family obligations call Joseph back to the city.

Breaking News in Yuba County

An overlooked pencil-pusher catches her husband in bed with another woman, the shock of which causes him to die of a heart attack. So she buries his body and takes advantage of the growing celebrity status that comes from having a missing husband. But she quickly finds herself in over her head, dodging cops and criminals, all while trying to keep the truth from her sister, a local news anchor who’s desperate for a story.

Psycho Therapy: The Shallow Tale of a Writer Who Decided to Write About a Serial Killer

A struggling writer in the midst of a divorce befriends a retired serial killer who incidentally becomes his marriage counselor by day, and killing counselor for his next book by night.

Hunting Season

When a reclusive survivalist and his daughter rescue a mysterious, wounded woman from a river, they become entangled in a deadly web of violence and revenge, forcing them to confront a brutal criminal to survive.

Treasure

A music journalist accompanies her father, a charmingly stubborn Holocaust survivor, on a journey to his homeland. While she's eager to make sense of her family's past, her dad has an agenda of his own.

Rosaline

Left heartbroken after Romeo begins to pursue her cousin Juliet, Rosaline schemes to foil the famous romance and win back her guy in this comedic twist of Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet.

The Roast of Tom Brady

Offensive lines. Full-contact comedy. Kevin Hart hosts this all-star roast of NFL legend Tom Brady.

My Favourite Cake

Mahin lives alone in Tehran since her husband’s death and her daughter’s departure for Europe, until an afternoon tea with friends leads her to break her solitary routine and revitalize her love life.

How to Please a Woman

When her all-male house-cleaning business gets out of control, a mature woman must embrace her own sexuality, if she is to make a new life for herself.