In light of the massive, bloody crackdown on protests in Iran in early January and current events, we are showing Ayat Najafi's film The Sun Will Rise at the Iranian New Year festival Nowruz, accompanied by a discussion with the director and cast.

In September 2022, young Iranian woman Mahsa Jina Amini died in hospital from severe head injuries inflicted by police officers. Allegedly, she had not worn her headscarf correctly. This sparked a revolutionary movement that became known under the battle cry “Jin, Jiyan, Azadî” (Woman, Life, Freedom).

In his film The Sun Will Rise, Berlin filmmaker Ayat Najafi, who was in Iran in the fall/winter of 2022/23, accompanies the theater rehearsals of an independent ensemble rehearsing the Greek comedy Lysistrata. Here, too, women are resisting the tyranny of a patriarchal society. While rehearsals take place indoors, women demonstrate outside for their rights. When the regime violently suppresses the demonstrations and protesters seek shelter in the rehearsal rooms, the ensemble must ask itself whether it wants to express itself through its art and get directly involved on the streets. As a representative of the diaspora, the director also has to deal with critical questions from his team.