Peyman Haghani’s latest feature film 316 enjoys a unique style of narration through one woman’s singular passion for shoes as she recalls her life in voiceover, from a childhood interrupted by revolution and war, through adulthood, motherhood and old age.
“I don't care what people look like, but what shoes they wear,” says the narrator of this Iranian film.
316 is Haghani’s second feature film (the first being A Man Who Ate His Cherries) which employs playful and inventive images framed entirely around people’s footwear. It never shows the faces of the actors and the whole story is narrated through shoes, hands and legs that are at our side from birth to death but we rarely give them much attention.
316 refers to the 316 pairs of shoes the protagonist has worn in her life; shoes that change as she ages and as the political situation changes around her.
The film encompasses a snippet of the history of Iran, from the 1979 Islamic Revolution to the terrible war with Saddam Hussein’s Iraq to the contemporary Iran.
316 has also enjoyed international exposure thanks to various film festivals in Germany, San Francisco and Prague.
The Art & Experience group is currently screening the film in various cinemas including Farhang, Azadi, Kourosh, Cinema Musuem, and Iranian Artists Forum in Tehran as well as a number of cinemas in other provinces.
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