No One Knows About Persian Cats

Artists by their very nature abhor restrictions. But American musicians who loudly complain about industry groups like the Recording Industry Association of America placing warning stickers on their CDs don't realize how easy they have it: Imagine dealing with the strictures of Islamic law, which view music as ghéna, or impure. Western music, in particular, is virtually banned in countries like Iran.

But restriction can have a positive effect. Creating art that is forbidden makes it dangerous; making music or film becomes an act of rebellion, adding vitality to the final result.

Iranian director Bahman Ghobadi understands this well. Best known for his feature "A Time for Drunken Horses," the director spent two years preparing the film "60 Seconds About Us" only to have the government pull his authorization to shoot at the last minute. In a fit of rage against the machine—and a flash of inspiration—he made "No One Knows About Persian Cats" instead.

Shot guerrilla-style over 17 days in 2009 without official sanction, the film explores Tehran's vibrant music scene. The film claims there are more than 300 musicians performing Western-style music in Iran (apartment walls show posters of Kurt Cobain and Arctic Monkeys), most of which literally underground—in soundproofed basements and apartments, rehearsing in cow paddocks or at construction sites to avoid the authorities. If they are caught, musicians face arrest and imprisonment, sometimes for months. (One singer is filmed completely out of focus, which I suspect was to protect her identity.)

The movie stars real-life musicians Negar Shaghaghi and Ashkan Koshanejad as themselves and actor Hamed Behdad (who claims he is the 'Marlon Brando of Iran'). The plot—of Negar and Ashkan, after getting out of prison, seeking a visa to leave Iran and play a gig in London—is a thinly veiled excuse to showcase an array of talented local performers playing jazz, indie rock, metal, rap, and so forth.

In the beginning the ploy works, especially as Behdad as their hard-hustling agent of sorts—think the scruffy hustler Robert De Niro played in "Mean Streets" with a smidge of Ari Gold from "Entourage"—takes the pair around town to put together a backup band. Behdad alone provides enough thrust and comic relief to keep the story moving; Shaghaghi and Koshanejad are too passive to be engaging.

As the movie proceeds, Ghobadi shoots each successive music sequence more and more self-consciously as music videos, and with that the film loses its bearings, which is a shame. The filmmaker drains whatever dramatic tension he's built up, and the ending feels tacked on. Still, the many stellar music performances make the film worth seeing, as is Behdad's inspired—if not necessarily Brandoesque—performance.


Genre: Drama
Directed by: Bahman Ghobadi
Written by: Bahman Ghobadi, Hossein M. Abkenar and Roxana Saberi
Starring: Negar Shaghaghi, Ashkan Koshanejad and Hamed Behdad