Echoes Of Pomegranate
پژواک انار
A short film by Alex Bijan Zandi. Set during the protests for Mahsa Amini, an Iranian-American family’s country road trip transforms into a pulsating journey of revolutionary and archival wonder. It premiered at the 2024 Maryland Film Festival and was nominated for the Jury Prize at the Montclair Film Festival.
15 MIN / USA / ENGLISH, FARSI / DRAMA, SUSPENSE
✦ VIEW TRAILER BELOW ✦
Synopsis
Furious after the tragic death of an Iranian woman who did not "properly" wear her hijab, Shirin takes to social media to show her support. However her father, who lived through the bloody 1979 Iranian Revolution, fears that Shirin’s protest video will put their family in danger. Confronting these hopes and traumas while on an eerie upstate New York road trip, Shirin and her dad discover reconciliation in their family’s archive and an ethereal redemption of their homeland.
Director’s Statement
After the tragic death of Mahsa Amini for not “correctly” wearing her enforced hijab, protestors stormed the streets of Iran demanding basic human rights. This energy spread to young Iranian-Americans like my sister and I. However, our father’s generation was cynical.
I believe a space exists between our youthful optimism and our dad’s stark realism. As we savor sweet pomegranates, this space flickers. Grainy photos of our grandmother in the 60s Iranian countryside illuminate as Dad wipes a tear and smiles at us. Unpacking this archive, ECHOES OF POMEGRANATE destabilizes genre conventions to evoke the intergenerational trauma of the Iranian community while also redeeming homeland in the fantastical film grain.
Starring Awni Abdi-Bahri and Ramin Doostdar
✦ FOR MAHSA AMINI AND ALL THE BRAVE ONES ✦
WOMEN, LIFE, FREEDOM زن، زندگی، آزادی
✦ FOR MAHSA AMINI AND ALL THE BRAVE ONES ✦ WOMEN, LIFE, FREEDOM زن، زندگی، آزادی
Alex Bijan ZandI
Writer and director Alex Bijan Zandi is an award winning Iranian-American filmmaker and artist based in Brooklyn. His work explores the social difficulties and enchantments of the Middle Eastern diaspora. Zandi studied creative writing at the Washington University in St. Louis where he received the Howard Nemerov Prize for Poetry. He went on to receive an MFA in Film/Video at Bard College. Zandi is a 2023 Jerome Hill Artist Fellow, was a 2022 Reykjavík Film Festival Talent Lab fellow, and in 2021 participated in the MACRO x The Black List Feature Screenwriter Incubator. His films have been screened internationally at venues including the Amsterdam International Film Festival (Best Experimental Film Award), Brooklyn Film Festival, Abrons Art Center, Knockdown Center, Kemper Art Museum, Petzel Gallery, and Malcolm X Gallery.
Key Collaborators
Executive Producer Alexandra Byer
Alexandra Byer is a Brooklyn-based producer and co-founder of RATHAUS FILMS. She recently produced Noah Pritzker’s MEN OF DIVORCE (San Sebastián 2023) and Kevin Steen’s DARON, DARON COLBERT (Locarno 2022). Byer was nominated for the John Cassavetes Award at the 2020 Independent Spirit Awards.
Executive Producer Madeleine Askwith
Madeleine Askwith is a creative Producer from Aotearoa New Zealand. Maddy produced Cedric Cheung-Lau’s THE MOUNTAINS ARE A DREAM THAT CALL TO ME (Sundance 2020) and Tim Sutton’s FUNNY FACE (Berlinale 2020). She has also produced documentaries such as EARTH WORKS (Viceland 2017).
Director of Photography Shannon Palmer
Shannon Palmer is an award-winning director of photography from Baltimore. She recently shot Abby Harri’s SIDE HUSTLE (Palm Springs ShortFest 2023), ABBY’S PLACE (ESPN+ 2022), ALWAYS JANE (Amazon 2021), and contributed to XY Chelsea (Showtime 2019).
Producer Taylor Ervin
Taylor Ervin is a creative producer and filmmaker born and raised in rural Ohio. He produces award winning short form content for television networks and streamers including USA, Peacock, SYFY, Paramount+, and others.
