British Passport

…
A film by Mahmood Pouyandeh
A Ph.D. Candidate young woman’s article
has been accepted in an international
conference in London. However, her
husband does not give a permission to
her to leave the country. She then intends
to leave the country illegally. she decides
to meet a passport and visa forger who is
introduced to her by one of her friends.
The forger gives her a British passport
which is stolen from a British tourist in
“Shiraz” (an ancient city in Iran) a few
days ago. In the airport she has been
accused of something she has not known
about the tourist. She has to defend
herself.
Director Statement:
was loosely based on real events.
The right of leaving the country with their own permission has been a
challenging problem for women in Iran. It is a law that despite opposition
from civil right society is still enforced and prevent the Iranian women
from leaving the country without the permission of their fathers and
husbands as their rightful guardians. Meanwhile the elite women of
sciences, arts and sports suffer the most by the consequences of this law.
This short film is based on a true story of an elite scientific woman who is
not allowed to attend an international conference in London due to the
disagreement she has with her husband and decides to leave the country
illegally. Firstly, she takes this disagreement to the court and since she
does not receive any support from legal authorities, she intends to make a
bold and risky move. With a deadline coming up for the conference she
intends to travel by air from her home country to London, unlike other
illegal immigrants who cross borders through lands or seas. She gets
arrested as a British citizen in Iran’s airport which mildly refers to the fact
that many foreign tourists or academics also get arrested and interrogated
by security agencies for no apparent reason while travelling to through
Iran. We have been trying to be the voice of voiceless Iranian and foreign
women (the ones who travel to Iran as tourists) especially scientific
personalities who are bound to gets arrested and stay grounded and
passive by barbaric laws of the country with or without knowing their own
rights. The Iranian women living in this country and the tourists who cam
only to visit and end up getting arrested for different excuses and false
accusations. Pioneer women who do not give in to these obstacles and take
the initiative themselves, regardless of any consequences that overshadow
them. Presenting this courageous act in the medium of short film had a
human and transnational motivation for me that a woman struggles to
achieve her goals despite what society and constitutions dictates.

Categories: Action, Drama, Family