Teheran: screening of a film about the inmates of the prisons at Rebibbia and Spoleto
The life and humanity of the inmates of the prisons of Spoleto and Rebibbia are described in the documentary “Open the Door” by the Iranian director Shahram Karimi, screened on 24 September at the residence of the Italian Ambassador in Tehran, Giuseppe Perrone.
“Open the Door” was produced in 2014 by Fiamma Arditi for the Senza Frontiere Festival.
Shot entirely in the male maximum security prison in Spoleto and the female prison at Rebibbia,the film retraces the everyday moments, hopes, dreams, and fantasies of the inmates, who become the protagonists of a film that is partly a documentary and partly a collective autobiography. In front of Karimi’s camera the men lead a normal life in which they dance, train, cook, write poetry, and imagine life beyond the bars. The women sing, paint, organise picnics in the prison garden, build a makeshift house, and take care of one another.
The common thread that connects both parts of the film is a staging of Leonardo da Vinci’s Last Supper in which prisoners recreate vivid images of Jesus Christ and the apostles, in an image of great artistic and spiritual intensity. At the screening in Ambassador Perrone’s residence, the director recounted the most significant moments he spent with the inmates during the shooting, and stressed that prison can be a place for personal growth if you are able to listen to the humanity that exists within each person.
Born in Shiraz in 1957, Shahram Karimi is also an esteemed painter and poet who since 1988 has divided his life and work between Germany, the United States, and Iran. He worked in 2006 in Italy with the art galleries “Il Gabbiano” in Rome and “Noire” at the Chapel of San Sebastiano in Turin. He participated in the 2007 and 2009 Bologna art fairs and, most recently, collaborated with the Senza Frontiere Festival in Rome.
