A new documentary showing at the London Film Festival looks at
Iran's underground rock scene. In this case, "underground" meaning not so much "uncommercial" as "illegal":
The threat of the police and authorities is all around. Bands soundproof secret rehearsal spaces and venues; one heavy metal band avoids arrest by playing in a stinking cowshed on a farm far out of town; members of another band talk about having their instruments confiscated. The police are often out of shot, however - perhaps adding to the omnipresent menace and what feels like an arbitrary exercise of power. When Negar's car is stopped and her pet dog taken from her, we never see the police officer who does the snatching.
The film,
No One Knows About Persian Cats, was co-written by Iranian-American journalist Roxana Saberi, who was subsequently imprisoned by the Iranian regime.