Indian filmmaker Sreemoyee Singh, world premiering her Iran documentary “And, Towards Happy Alleys” at the Berlin Film Festival’s Panorama strand is the culmination of a journey that began in 2015.
Singh completed a masters degree in film studies at Jadavpur University, Kolkata, India and went on to pursue a PhD on The Exiled Filmmaker in Post Revolution Iranian Cinema, with the objective of understanding the source of “impossible hope” in Iranian films. The filmmaker was also introduced to the poetry of Iran’s Forogh Farrokhzad during the course and “connected deeply” to her verses. A desire to read Farrokhzad’s verses in the original Persian led Singh to learn Farsi.
In December 2015, Singh travelled to Tehran for the first time as part of her work on the PhD and with the idea of making a documentary from her field research and experiences and enrolled in advanced Farsi-language classes. Funding for the film came from a brace of fellowships and Singh financed the rest of the documentary herself. During the course of her research, during which she travelled to Iran several times until 2019, staying three months each time, Singh got unprecedented access to some of the stalwarts of Iranian cinema including Jafar Panahi, Aida Mohammadkhani and Farhad Kheradmand and human rights activist Nasrin Soutodeh.
When Singh met Panahi, the filmmaker was already proscribed from making films for 20 years by the Iranian regime, a ban that he has defied regularly.
Panahi was arrested again in 2022 in the wake of Iran’s conservative government crackdown and released earlier this month. Singh, who was deeply impacted by the news of his re-arrest, stayed in touch with Panahi’s son to get news of the filmmaker. She was also in contact with Soutodeh, one of the leading voices in the ongoing women’s rights movement in Iran, who has also been arrested several times.
Being selected at Berlin is a “dream come true” for Singh and her executive producers Hussain Currimbhoy and Noopur Sinha as it is a festival that has constantly supported Iranian cinema. Panahi and his often-incarcerated compatriot Mohammad Rasoulof have both won Golden Bears.
