The Peddler

The film is made of three separate parts. All three are set in Iran. The subject is poverty and helplessness. In the first part there is a married couple. They are very poor and many of their children are disabled. They decide to leave their newborn baby. What they hope is that the child will live better elsewhere. The second part is about a young man. The man has a mental disability and lives alone. He is trying to look after his elderly mother. Her condition keeps getting worse. In the third part there is a street peddler. The man is frightened and cornered. He is trying to get away from his boss. Zohreh Sarmadi and Esmaeel Soltaniyan take the leads, with Mohammad Talaie also in the cast, in Mohsen Makhmalbaf’s Iranian film of 1987.