Once Upon a Time, Cinema

The film begins with a cinematographer. He is known by his trade rather than a name. He is looking for someone called Atieh. The name means future. As he calls out to her, time shifts. He falls back from the start of the twentieth century. Where he lands is nineteenth century Iran, under Naser al-Din Shah. The guards seize him. The man starts showing the shah films drawn from the history of Iranian cinema. The shah is taken with it and wants his family to see. Then he bans cinema, and afterwards falls for an actress on the screen. The film took special jury prizes at the Istanbul and Karlovy Vary festivals. Its director counted it the first of a trilogy about cinema. Ezzatollah Entezami and Mehdi Hashemi appear in the ninety two minute film, an Iranian production Mohsen Makhmalbaf finished in 1992.