Episode 03 / Visions du Réel - The Silhouettes with Afsaneh Salari
In this episode, we feature a conversation with Director / Producer Afsaneh Salari from Iran about her feature film, The Silhouettes, which is had its World Premiere at Vision du Reel.
The Silhouettes tells the intimate story of an Afghan refugee family living in Iran for over 35 years as their youngest son takes the difficult to return to Afghanistan because of the limited opportunities that exist for immigrants in Iran.
Afsaneh has an impressive eye that is immediately visible in her framing from the first shot of the film and carries through until the last frame. However, her talents as a filmmaker go beyond composition. She also has strong intuition as a filmmaker and manages to artfully capture the tension in quiet, everyday moments. As a result, we feel the burden and limitations placed on this family of immigrants in Iran as if it were in our own country.
In the conversation, Anna Savchenko, a former classmate of Afsaneh’s speaks with her on the eve of her premiere to discuss the inspiration for the film and how she managed multiple roles as Producer, director, and cinematographer. Afsaneh also talks about her decision to premiere the film online during these times of COVID.
Episode is also available on Spotify, Apple Podcast and Soundcloud
ABOUT THE DIRECTORS / AFSANEH SALARI
In an afternoon in spring 1994, when Afsaneh was only 6 years old, her father asked her to bring him a pen. He then wrote: “I, Afsaneh, promise I will never marry and instead, devote my life to social change .“ He then asked her to sign the paper. From that day on, the joke turned out to be a source of stress for the girl who wanted to become an artist, but later in life, she finds herself not very far from both universes.
She discovered cinema at the Art University of Tehran, where she saw in cinematic language a powerful tool to explore layers of meaning about human condition. She was the first Iranian to win the French foreign ministry scholarship to participate in La Femis documentary course in 2011. She then went to France to study Masters of creative directing at University of Paris 8 and in 2015, she received another master degree in documentary directing through Docnomads joint masters.
Through her films, Afsaneh explores human condition within the peripheries of modern societies in different meanings and forms: war, labour, immigration, and old age are topics she’s worked on so far. For the film she directs and produces, Afsaneh has so far received funds form IDFA Bertha Fund, Sundance Institute, Doha Institute, Asian Cinema Fund and Vision Sud Est fund.
The first film she produced with an Afghan filmmaker, The Forbidden Strings | تارهای ممنوعه was premiered at IDFA 2019. Afsaneh’s other passions include finding the animal equivalent of her friends and cooking different versions of lentil soup.
ABOUT THE FILM / THE SILHOUETTES
FILM WEBSITE: THE SILHOUETTES, by Afsaneh Salari
PRODUCED BY: Afsaneh Salari and Jewel Maranan
SYNOPSIS : At the height of the USSR’s invasion of Afghanistan in 1982, 1.5 million Afghans took a long journey to the border of Iran to flee war. TAGHI, born after that generation, is a testament to and unwilling to inherit the limitations of his parents’ refugee status, navigates outside the protective walls of his family to trace his identity and the doors to his future in the homeland he never knew. As war continues to rage in Afghanistan, what future awaits him in which land?
PRODUCTION COMPANY: Docmaniacs | Cinema Is Incomplete
Co-production countries Iran & Philippine
GRANTS AND SUPPORT: Sundance Institute Documentary Film Program, Open Society Foundations, JustFilms | Ford Foundation , Visions sud est, Asian Network of Documentary, Karlovy Vary Docs In Progress, Berlinale Talents Docstations