Born in Evin
starts in German cinemas October 10, 2019. Born in Evin follows filmmaker and actress, Maryam Zaree, on her quest to find out the violent circumstances surrounding her birth inside one of the most notorious political prisons in the world. Exactly forty years have passed since the monarchy of the Shah of Iran was toppled and the Islamic Republic declared. In the 1980’s Ayatollah Khomeini, the so-called religious leader, had tens of thousands of political opponents arrested, persecuted and murdered. Among them the filmmaker’s parents who, after years in prison, managed to seek asylum in Germany. The family never talked about their persecution and imprisonment. Maryam Zaree faces the decades-long silence and explores her own questions about the place and the circumstances of her birth.
She meets other survivors, talks to experts and looks for the children born in the same prison. She tries to find answers to her personal and political questions. What are the personal consequences of persecution and violence when the same perpetrators remain in power while the victims internalize their stories? And what does it mean, politically, to face the silence within the family. The political is private and the private political. With this conviction, Maryam Zaree works through the complexities of trauma and denial. 2016
Participent of the 12th International DOK Leipzig Co-Pro Market
2019
Seal of Approval ‘highly recommended’
Compass-Perspektive-Award for the best film in the programme of 69th BERLINALE, Perspektive Deutsches Kino
IFFF Dortmund | Köln 2019
26 Hot Docs Toronto
nominated for German Documentary Award 2019 - SWR DOKU FESTIVAL
awarded at FEST- New Directors New Films Festival in Portugal:
Audience Award
Cineuropa Audience Award for Best Feature Film
Golden Lynx - International Feature Films Competition
nominated FIRST STEPS Award 2019
Duhok International Film Festival, Iraq
International Human Rights Film Festival Albania
Awarded Best Documentary at Fünf Seen Film Festival
International Human Rights Film Festival Berlin
Heartland Film Festival, USA
IFF Cologne
36 Dokfest Kassel
IDFA - Best of Fests
2020
DEUTSCHER FILMPREIS – German Film Award – BEST DOCUMENTARY 2020
- Director Marayam Zaree
- Producer Ira Tondowski, Alex Tondowski, Karin C. Berger (Golden Girls Filmproduction GmbH), Arash T. Riahi (Golden Girls Filmproduction GmbH)
- Director of Photography Siri Klug
- Editor Dieter Pichler
- Sound Michel Klöfkorn
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