111 Girls / 111 Dokhtar
Iraq / 2012 / 79 min.
Director: Nahid GHOBADI & Bijan ZAMANPIRA
[Introduction]
The Iranian president receives a pleading letter from a woman. It has been sent on behalf of 111 Kurdish women complaining of their inability to find husbands, and says that if the government does nothing, they will commit mass suicide. An official named DONYADIDEH is given the task of solving this conundrum, and heads to Kurdistan with an assistant and a guide. He does not take the letter seriously at first, but then learns of the realities facing Kurdistan, which is groaning under the strain of a labor shortage caused by men migrating to the cities in search of work, and realizes that the women's plight is no lie. Can he successfully prevent them from taking their own lives? "111 Girls", co-directed by Bahman GHOBADI's elder sister Nahid and Bijan ZAMANPIRA, is a tour de force that evokes Kurdistan's present situation with an eccentric premise and powerful visuals. The issues that the film conveys are serious, but it has a superb structure that sporadically injects dreamlike scenes and humor. This is a startling directorial debut.
Nahid GHOBADI
Born in Baneh in Iranian Kurdistan. Studied at Columbia University, and also worked as an assistant director to her younger brother Bahman GHOBADI. Directed short films including "Cinema That Under Rain Becomes What All Over" (04). "111 Girls" is her feature directorial debut.
Bijan ZAMANPIRA
Born in 1965 in Iranian Kurdistan. Majored in Persian literature at Payame Noor University in Tehran, graduating in 1995. Began a career as a photographer in 1998, and studied cinematography at the Youth Cinema Institute in Tehran from 1998 to 2000.
