The Deer ((Masoud Kimiai, 1974)

We continue with our exploration of the Iranian Cinema on offer at the Wales One World festival with a discussion of the extraordinary The Deer, a metaphor for pre-revolutionary Iran's social relations, focussing on down and outs living in a courtyard with a heroin addict and a bank robber as heroes. The influence of Italian neo-realism is everywhere present in a film that is simultaneously symbolic but also pulpy and visceral. It's an iconic film extra-textually as well: a cinema showing the film was burned down killing hundreds of people. It's a film that is still banned in Iran.