“It’s a protest movement behind the windows”: A tribute to Iranians who risk their lives to photograph the opposition | Berlin Film Festival 2026

FWidely circulated video footage from Iran in late 2022 showed a woman being shot by security forces while filming a bloody crackdown on anti-government protests on her phone. The victim’s last words were: “Film it!”

Mehraneh Soleimian graduated from art school on the same day, and that last wish led her and her partner, Amin Pakparfar, to debut their short documentary at the Berlin Film Festival on Tuesday. “Powerful Memories” is dedicated to the murdered woman, Shirin Alizadeh, and the role of amateur videos in recording and encouraging dissent in Iran.

Chicago film students Salimian and Pakparvar are now working through a large collection of anonymous smartphone videos — they estimate they have watched about 2,000 clips — as well as their own footage collected in Tehran during the 2022-2023 “Women, Life, Freedom” uprising.

“We hope we can isolate this time period in Iranian history,” says Soleimian, 26. “Even though there has been more brutality since then, more violence, that period was also important.”

In their film, they highlight the unique perspective of people who film from a place of alleged safety behind the windows of a car or home to hold authorities accountable and challenge official narratives of violent incidents — a tactic that was also used recently during anti-ICE protests in Minneapolis.

“There was a lot of tension between the lies or false information that the state media was showing about the movement and what we were witnessing,” Sulaimian says. “The demonstrators started filming the events and uploading them anonymously to the Internet. It was like a movement happening from behind the windows.”

Slimian describes that space as “like a threshold, a location that was not on the street, but was not in the safety of the home.”

“Sherine was one of the people who was filming the events from behind her window when she was shot and killed” on September 22, 2022, she says. “I was very emotional. It shocked me to the core.”

Alizadeh was in a car driven by her husband, with two other travel companions, when they saw protesters being shot dead in the street in the northeastern town of Salmanshahr as they tried to drive back to their city of Isfahan. Her smartphone footage of the crowd of protesters when security forces opened fire features prominently in the film, along with her command to a fellow passenger, “Film it!” While a woman appeared to be lying on the side of the road, shot dead.

Seconds later, at least one bullet penetrated the car’s back window and struck 36-year-old Alizadeh in the neck and head, according to Amnesty International. She died in hospital.

These painful images are interspersed with dramatic scenes filmed by Salimian and Pakparvar, 28, from their apartment during the same period, as neighbors join in a chorus of anti-regime protest songs from their own apartments.

“For decades, Iranians have been protesting, and each time their voices have been suppressed and censored,” says Pakparvar. “But two years later, they protested again in greater numbers.” “Their courage is contagious, and despite their repression, they see the value of rising again and again.”

The protests have evolved from a focus on restrictions on women’s rights, including mandatory hijab, into a broader-based movement that has erupted in recent months. Pakparvar says that this was accompanied by an Internet blackout by the authorities to prevent the sharing of these videos, as well as horrific acts of violence against demonstrators in which thousands were killed.

“This is a state strategy and it’s somewhat successful, but not completely,” he says. “There were Starlink satellites that people were able to use” to distribute images. “Every day we see more and more videos of the massacre. It is heartbreaking.”

The filmmakers say they won’t be able to attend the Berlin premiere because they are in the US on a student visa, and will be barred from returning under a travel ban that President Trump reimposes in 2025. But they will join the presentation via video link.

They say the reaction in Chicago has already confirmed the film’s resonance, with fellow students comparing it to China under the Covid lockdown and American activism during the Black Lives Matter movement. “It shows that we are living in a very vulnerable moment internationally and that people are looking for freedom in different contexts,” Pakparvar says.

They are both optimistic that one day they will return to a free and democratic Iran. “Hopefully we’re being honest. They can’t control it anymore.” Pakparvar says about the system.

“Maybe if you asked us 10 years ago, we didn’t have any general sense of the kind of freedom we wanted. But now it’s quite clear. We know our rights, we know the purpose, we know the values ​​we want in our lives and in our country. As you see millions of people realize that and we’re moving toward it.”

The Berlinale has long championed dissident filmmakers in Iran. On opening night on Thursday, Iranian creatives walked the red carpet carrying “Free Iran” signs. The next day, independent Iranian filmmakers performed with volunteers lying on the ground symbolizing those killed during the January protests.