Hana Makhmalbaf, 19, is the youngest of the clan of Iranian filmmakers who, alongside Abaas Kiarostami, put Iranian film at the epicentre of world cinema. Her father, Moshen, made The Silence and founded the Makhmalbaf Film School. Her sister Samira helmed the award winning The Apple and her brother Maysam is proving himself a fine editor.
It may come as no surprise then that cinema has been the primary focus of Hana's life. At the age of 7 she appeared in her father's drama A Moment of Innocence and by the time she was 14 she'd directed a documentary that world premiered at the Venice Film Festival. However, her family name is also something of a poisoned chalice; Hana has to carry the burden of expectation that comes with being an eponymous member of the The Makhmalbaf Film House, and endure cynicism about her father being more than just an interested writer, editor, or adviser on his family's films.
Hana's fictional feature film debut, Buddha Collapsed Out of Shame, is proof that there is an interesting new and unique voice in the family. It's very different to anything that Moshen has made, even if it can be seen as part of the group of films made in Afghanistan by The Makhmalbaf Film House. The family's Afghanistan films started with Kandahar, made by Moshen just before September 11. It tells the story of an Afghan refugee living in Canada who returns to Afghanistan to try and stop her sister from committing suicide. On her return, she sees how the harsh regime has transformed attitudes in Afghanistan.
In 2003, Hana's sister Samira made At Five in the Afternoon, which questions whether the American led invasion has made a difference to Afghanistan. The homeless protagonist, oblivious to the cruel everyday reality of her life, dreams about becoming Afghanistan's first female president. It was during the making of Samira's film that Hana shot Joy of Madness, a documentary highlighting the difficulties of casting non-professional actors in Kabul in 2002.
Buddha Collapsed Out of Shame focuses on the children of Afghanistan, showing the affect that living in a war-torn society has on their mindset. It's a magnificent mix of Lord of the Flies and Tarkovsky's Ivan's Childhood. A single-minded eight year old girl (Niktbakhat Noruz) wants to go to school. She tries to enrol in her neighbour's boys' school but is sent away on account of her gender. The girl is then terrorised by a group of boys playing at Cowboys and Indians.
The boys' use of language and ideology is strikingly similar to that of the Taliban and this fact enables Hana to create a powerful allegory in which she questions whether there can be any hope for a generation brought up on divisive politics in a war-torn environment. "Children are the future adults," Hana says. "If they get used to violence, the future of the world will be in great danger. A teenaged boy in the film says, 'When I grow up I will kill you'. Because as a child he has been through lots of violence, it has become part of his usual life. I think that children's real school is observing and copying their parents' behaviour or other adults around them.
"The irony is that even those who had come to rescue Afghanistan first destroyed it, and then didn't find the time to rebuild it until the next so-called rescue group came and went through the same destruction and violence again and again and again. And this violence has been injected over and over from different groups into the culture of the people in this country so strongly that you can see it in how the children play."
Such irony is a trait that has been mastered by the Makhmalbaf family of filmmakers. (It is also an important component of much recent Iranian cinema.) Even the film's title is dripping with double meanings. "I got this title from a metaphorical quote from my father, Mohsen Makhmalbaf, which meant that even a statute can be ashamed to witness all the violence and harshness happening to these innocent people and therefore, collapse," Hana explains.
"The other reason for choosing this title was that people think that in a city where a Buddha statue exists nothing that violent could happen. I wanted to show the contrast and irony of it and show that all this harshness and violence that has happened right under these symbols of innocence and calmness." Criticism has been aimed at Buddha because, to make the film, the children had to play out horrific scenes. The girl is bullied and prodded on screen, but Makhmalbaf had no qualms about recreating the tough realities of life.
"These children are living in this sort of situation, so they are used to it," she says. "In fact, this is what I am trying to show with this film and hopefully try to make a change to their harsh conditions." She also adds that working with children was her favourite part of making this film. The violent behaviour of the boys in Buddha seems to suggest that there isn't much hope for the next generation of Afghans. Hana argues that the future will echo the past unless there is radical change.
"The Taliban are gone but their impact still remains on this culture," she says. "Continuous wars in Afghanistan have destroyed the culture more than the country. The violence that has raided the souls of the children through wars in this country may erupt in the future. But the children in this country, unlike the American children who learn violence through Hollywood action films, have learnt it by witnessing some of the harshest things happening to their relatives in front of their eyes. They have witnessed their fathers being beheaded in their gardens."
The stories she heard in Afghanistan are reflected in the film's finale. "As I started shooting, I saw and heard new things around the subject and also paid close attention to the children playing around us, and decided to bring some of those games and new information in my story. For example, I met a guy who was a Communist during the Russian invasion of Afghanistan and then he became a Mullah during the Taliban and now he was working with the Americans. He has always been in close contact with the people in power during the past two decades. This man is being played by a boy in the film who always kills people but each time with a different name, thus representing different groups."
The Makhmalbaf Film House's decision to make art in Afghanistan is not simply a case of taking advantage of the war and the current world order for heightened emotional impact. It's more a case of expediency and necessity. It has become impossible for the Makhmalbafs to make films in their homeland of Iran. "Cinema has practically exiled us. My father officially lives like a gypsy in order to get away from censorship. For example, this film was made in Afghanistan, edited in Tajikistan and laboratory work was done in Germany."
This begs the question whether the family are really talking about the situation in Iran, even though their most recent films have been set in Afghanistan. "This film, despite not being made in Iran, is about common sufferings that exist both in Iran and Afghanistan. Both societies have cultural/political problems alike." She is also quick to add that she'd like to make films closer to home. "Any story that may interest me and anywhere it may be possible to obtain permission for making, I will make my films. I have many stories that take place in Iran and hopefully one day when I have the permission I will make them. Now it is not an easy time."
It's not just through cinema that this prodigious talent tries to express her view of the world. She's a poet and a writer, too, and chooses her craft to match the message she wants to tell. "For me, cinema is like a tool. I just use this tool to talk about the pain people are going through in their daily life. What is more, as a teenage girl living in Iran under current conditions and having to bear with ideological, political and social pressures, I have a lot to say. Most of the time this is expressed in the form of short stories."
However, Hana, like the rest of her family, has the biggest international impact when she uses cinema as a mode of expression.