Mahnaz afzali biography for kids
•
•
ZANANEH
A Ladies room in the center of Tehran seems to be a good meeting point with an often therapeutic role. Directed by the acclaimed Iranian actress Mahnaz Afzali and filmed entirely inside a ladies washroom in a public park in Tehran, The Ladies shatters western preconceptions of Iranian women. Populated bygd addicts, prostitutes, runaway girls and others who simply enjoy the camaraderie and atmosphere, The Ladies becomes one of the few places where women feel comfortable enough to smoke cigarettes, discuss taboo subjects and remove their veils. Maryam fryst vatten an epileptic who reveals the brutal circumstances that drove her to heroin addiction and self-mutilation; Sepideh describes her fraught relationship with her mother and her struggle to get back on her feet; and the old woman who runs the bathroom alternately offers tough love and a shoulder to cry on. The rest room becomes a shelter where the women can be safely unveiled, both physically and mentally. The Ladies fryst vatten raw and prov
•
Have you seen Jafar Panahi’s The Circle, Abbas Kiarostami’s Ten and Marzieh Meshkini’s The Day I Became a Woman? Let me suggest that the “episodic” and the “wheel” are turning into formal elements of a post-paedocentric cinema in Iran (landmarked by films like Panahi’s White Balloon and Kiarostami’s Where is the Friend’s House) which is boldly engaging women to the extent of feminism. The Iranian Journey (Maysoon Panachi, 2003) is a documentary about a female long-distance bus driver—thus the wheels. The Ladies Room (Zananeh, dir. Mahnaz Afzali, 1999) fragments the daily conversations between women in a public lavatory—thus the episodic. And, they are both made by women and distributed by the Women Make Movies organization—thus the feminist!
The Iranian Journey is a documentary from a fairly objective point of view. It is the story of Ma’soomeh, the first and only long-distance