Jafar Panahi

...

Panahi's This Is Not a Film is very high on my list.

Uh, the film from, I wanna say 2016, Tower, is incredible.

[gasps]

At the Arts Centre, the Film Society screens It Was Just an Accident, in which a group of former political prisoners in Iran think they found the man who tortured them, and an ordinary car accident sparks a tense, darkly comic debate about revenge.

Shot in secret by director Jafar Panahi and winner of the Palme d'Or at Cannes, subtitled Certificate XIIA from half past seven until quarter past nine.

And at Father's House, the Free Acoustic Café opens its doors at half past seven with music from eight, featuring Debbie Cassell and Martin Ansell making their debut, The Hats trying out a brand-new lineup, and returning favorites Pete Robson, Plum Loco, and Rich Atkinson & The New Billionaires, with a hat going round for the musicians.

Tomorrow, Saturday gets going with the free timed parkrun at Compton Abbas Airfield at nine, the Emporium's second day at the Town Hall, and a tidy up of Semley Churchyard from ten until eleven, where helpers are being asked to bring gardening tools, with strimmers especially useful, and even an hour's effort will be appreciated with coffee and cakes as a thank you.

Ninety minutes of centuries-old folklore, local legends, and genuinely unexplained stories with no actors and no staged scares, just real history.

Over at the Arts Centre, the Film Society screens the Iranian thriller It Was Just an Accident from half past seven, in which a group of former political prisoners think they've captured their old torturer and a simple car accident spirals into a tense, darkly funny moral drama shot in secret by director Jafar Panahi, subtitled Certificate XIIA and running till quarter past nine.

And at Father's House, the Free Acoustic Café opens its doors at half past seven with music from eight o'clock, featuring The Two Hats and welcome returns from Pete Robson, Plum Loco, and Rich Atkinson & The New Billionaires, with a hat passed round for the musicians.

Saturday kicks off with the free timed park run at Compton Airfield at nine o'clock, while the Emporium's second day continues at the town hall, and the Arts Centre's Phoenix Room serves up Super Saturday from eleven till four with soup, savory snacks, cake, and coffee all waiting at tables.

I think radical Shiism in Iran is already dead.

Again, uh, if you look at some of the polls, if you look at some of the social media, uh, if you look at Iranian literature, Iranian cinema, uh, if you look at Panahi's mo- uh, most recent film, political Islam, Khamenei, Khomeini, uh, little Khamenei's version of radical Shiism is dead.

I think, uh, even radical Sunni is a nuisance right now.

The future of the Middle East, in my view, uh, is much more likely to be a future of the Middle East where, uh, Abrahamic accord are going to be determining the relationship.

Oh, oh, yeah.

Jafar Panahi's movie.

Yeah.

I can't think what it's called, but you know what I'm talking about.

In fact, you could probably just say that Iranian cinema splits in two directions.

You've got Breaking Fourth Wall with Panahi and Kiarostami, and then you've got Soaps.

And that's usually what I love.

This one just is laid on a bit thick, and I was getting a little tired of the twists.

academic and cultural institutions, and their films were funded by the government.

Jafar Panahi made his first films with funding from IRIB, Iranian Radio and Television under the Islamic Republic.

His first film, The White Balloon, which got the golden camera in Cannes, was actually produced by Islamic Republic of Iran Broadcasting.

So, I mean, many of these young filmmakers were enabled to make films by the, you know, different institutions, cultural institutions that the Islamic Republic.

It's essentially engaging and giving the community what they want because there's an audience for that.

Ultimately, they're able to do what they're doing because people are going and watching it, right? Like Acme, for example, I mean, I remember they screened Hitchcock movies to Jafar Panahi movies to...

Kurosawa movies, so there's a whole wide range and spectrum of not just established names, but even independent names, which we don't get to see anywhere else unless you're in San Francisco or one of those places where movies are a cultural stone of the city.

I agree with you, I think in London that that's the space.

But this is your-

"Gotta check out some early Panahi." [laughs]

[laughs]

I mean, that's, that's what I would do.

Early Panahi hits, though.

It hits.

[laughs] This is your, your bit about being, like, a fucking multitasking Ganesh where you have, like, one arm for each kid.