Taxi

Winner of the Golden Bear at the Berlin Film Festival, Taxi reveals Jafar Panahi as one of the most vital filmmakers of our time. His films have always drawn the attention of the Iranian authorities, culminating in his 2010 arrest and a 20-year ban from making movies. Despite these challenges, Panahi has ingeniously found ways to continue producing films without breaking the ban, and his third post-arrest work, Taxi, is no exception. Taxi follows Panahi as he drives a yellow cab that through the streets of Tehran, picking up a diverse group of passengers who candidly express their opinions and worldviews to a camera placed on the dashboard of his “mobile film studio.” Despite these humble means Panahi cleverly captures the spirit of Iranian society through this comedic, dramatic, subversive, and most unusual road movie. (82 mins., DCP)