Originally published on metropolis.co.jp on September 2012

Iranian filmmaker Jafar Panahi (The Circle, Crimson Gold, Offside) now tops my most-admired list. Sentenced in 2010 to six years in jail and a 20-year ban on making movies on vague “propaganda” charges related to the suspect reelection of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, he refuses to buckle. This message in a bottle from the (non)director, this assertion of creative resistance, chronicles a day in his life as he waits under house arrest for a ruling on his appeal. He talks with his lawyer on the phone, feeds a pet iguana, fools with his iPhone video camera, offers a few comments on his films, and outlines for his cinematographer and collaborator Mojtaba Mirtahmasb the screenplay he was denied permission to film. There’s not a lot going on here at first glance, but soon it becomes clear that, while at no time does he violate the letter of the preposterous injunction, he is creating a small work of art, a quiet act of defiance against repression. Smuggled out of Iran (in a USB clip in a cake) to be shown at Cannes, this courageous personal statement is helping the world keep abreast of ⎯ and understand ⎯ the situation in Iran. (René Magritte would dig the title.)