The First Letter

In this autobiographical film from the director of Delbaran, Emkan (Morady, furrowed and intense) is a gifted student and prayer leader, but his creative and romantic impulses constantly lead him into trouble with the authorities at school, mosque and home. When he falls in love with a Jewish neighbour, whose father screens Exodus and Chaplin comedies at the cinema he owns, matters only get worse. Jalili's episodic chronicle of repression is eccentrically weighted and sometimes hard to follow, but it feels true and hard won (it's his 400 Blows, perhaps), and the boy's relationship with his father is especially moving.