Tehran, An Unfinished History

Tehran, An Unfinished History offers a long glimpse into a Tehran no longer here: one of stark contrasts, both subtle and painstakingly obvious. A city’s untold sociopolitical transformations through 100 years of unseen archives from Iran’s national film archives.

Iranian cinema, from the decades prior to 1979, is one of the world’s greatest troves of treasure barely ever seen. There is also comparatively little written about it – even in Farsi. Which makes a film like IFFR-favourite Saeed Nouri’s Tehran, An Unfinished History an extremely enlightening and gruesomely grating watch: for it will be difficult to see the gems he unearthed and was able to use in fine quality digital excerpts thanks to the project’s generous support by Iran’s national film archive. 

The Tehran discovered here has long gone (others might say, gone underground): a cosmopolitan place hip to the latest fashions of London or Paris, but also a city of excruciating contrasts where stark poverty and enormous wealth existed side by side. And Iranian cinema talked about it all, sometimes in a high melodramatic pitch, other times in subtly vériste whispers. Tehran, An Unfinished History is a gift to all cinephiles with curiosity in their heart, and all the film historians who know that they need to be dreamers and scientists alike!

– Olaf Möller

Trailer

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