The Circle

Jafar Panahi's film, set in Tehran, about the space women are permitted to move in. The structure is a chain: the film starts with one woman, follows her for a while, then passes to another woman she encounters, and so on. None of them knows the others, but all meet the same obstacles: unable to buy a bus ticket alone, unable to take a hotel room, stopped for smoking, refused at a hospital without a male companion. The title says it. The narrative returns to where it began and the closing takes place in the same location as the opening. Most of the characters have either just left prison or are on the run; what they did is usually not stated, and the film leaves that deliberately unclear. Most of the cast are not professionals. It won the Golden Lion at the Venice film festival in 2000. Its exhibition was banned in Iran. In the years after this film Panahi faced many restrictions, including a ban on directing and imprisonment. An important work for anyone who likes Iranian cinema and social realist narrative. For a viewer expecting resolution or explanation, the film finishes no character's story and offers no relief.