No One Knows About Persian Cats (12)

Dir. Bahman Ghobadi, Iran, 2009, 102mins

Cast: Negar Shaghaghi, Ashkan Koshanejad, Hichkas

Review by Christopher Upton

Freedom is a strange thing; with freedom comes justifiable complacency and the only time freedom becomes tangible is when it's taken away. The idea that something as accessible as music, either playing or listening to it, could be criminalised might seem impossible to comprehend but Persian Cats , based on a true story, shows just how hard some people in the world have to work to enjoy the privilege.

Negar and Ashkan are a pair of musicians looking for a passport and a visa in order to escape the oppressive cities of Iran to share their music with London. Aided by fast-talking and charismatic lowlife Nader, they embark on a quest through the underground to find a group of musicians who can back them on their trip. What follows is a trip through Iran's cities and backstreets where government rules have irreversibly changed the lives of the youth.

Directed by award winning Iranian director Bahman Ghobadi, this is a showcase of an Iran that hasn't received a large amount exposure in the west. It's a youthful, rebellious portrait that shows a great deal of heart from everyone onscreen, and yet, while it comments on the government's oppressive nature, this is a love letter to the people of Iran and the country itself.

Rapper Hichkas, playing himself in the film, displays an extreme amount of civic pride for the people that have grown up in these harsh conditions; the idea that these harsh rhymes could raise from another environment is very suspect. The unity and strength on display is more than admirable, it is downright heroic. These groups have formed together and risked arrest simply to express themselves artistically.

As for the music itself it sounds remarkably like its western counterparts with the band Take It Easy Hospital, who have supplied most of the music that the title characters perform, sounding like Velvet Underground, Interpol and At The Drive In all thrown in together. For musicophiles it's a great glimpse into new bands as there are gratuitous performing sections including a hardcore metal song played for an audience of cows. The sheer amount of time spent focussing on the performance however, might take you out of the action if you aren't as musically inclined and the story isn't quite as powerful as the idea.

No One Knows About Persian Cats succeeds in highlighting the resilience of human nature and the lengths to which people will go to express themselves; in that respect it is incredibly heartening. As a story it isn't the strongest and might struggle to retain your attention for multiple watches, but by raising awareness of this it makes you feel extremely lucky to be able to take such things for granted.