THE HOUSE IS BLACK
Forough Farrokhzad, Iran, 35mm > digital, 22 min, 1962 The only film directed by trailblazing feminist Iranian poet Forough Farrokhzad finds unexpected grace where few would think to look: a leprosarium whose inhabitants live, worship, learn, play, and celebrate in a self-contained community cut off from the rest of the world. Through ruminative voiceover narration drawn from the Old Testament, the Koran, and the filmmaker’s own poetry, and unflinching images that refuse to look away from physical difference, Farrokhzad creates a profoundly empathetic portrait of those cast off by society—a face-to-face encounter with the humanity behind the disease. A key forerunner of the Iranian New Wave, The House Is Black is a triumph of transcendent lyricism from a visionary artist whose influence is only beginning to be fully appreciated.—Janus Films Forough Farrokhzad (1934–1967). One of Iran’s most significant modern poets, with multiple volumes published in her lifetime, including Reborn (1964). The House Is Black was the only film she directed in her short life before her untimely death in a car accident; the film won the Grand Prix from the International Kurzfilmtage Oberhausen (1964). Farrokhzad’s poetry was banned in Iran for more than two decades after the Islamic Revolution of 1979.
