Manuscripts Don't Burn دست‌نوشته‌ها نمی‌سوزند

Manuscripts Don't Burn

دست‌نوشته‌ها نمی‌سوزند‎‎
A film by Mohammad Rasoulof (DVD) (DVD)
In Farsi with English Subtitles

Editorial Review:
Mohammad Rasoulof was sentenced to six years in jail by the Iranian authorities because of his subversive filmmaking activities. The scathing MANUSCRIPTS DON'T BURN was clandestinely produced in protest of his conviction, bringing a whole new level of clarity and audacity to Rasoulof's (The White Meadows) already laudable career. Drawing from the true story of the government's attempted 1995 murder of several prominent writers and intellectuals, Rasoulof imagines a repressive regime so pervasive that even the morally righteous are subsumed or cast aside. A lacerating and slow-burning thriller filmed in a frigid palette of blues and grays. MANUSCRIPTS DON'T BURN is perhaps the most subversive and incendiary j'accuse lodged against an authoritarian regime since the fall of the Soviet Union.

Based on true events, the story revolves around a manuscript detailing a 1995 failed assassination plot by the Iranian regime against twenty-one writers and journalists. Almost twenty years later, the existence of this document remains a threat and the head of the censorship board has hired two killers, Morteza and Khosrow, to collect the remaining copies and silence the participants. A masterful storyteller, Rasoulof slowly reveals the relevant details, splitting the narrative between the henchmen and their isolated, state-oppressed victims. Shifting tone from suspense to art-house drama, and moving between past and present with seamless fluidity, we follow Morteza and Khosrow on their mission while silently observing the suffocating existence of three surviving writers. Rasoulof was arrested in 2010 alongside fellow filmmaker Jafar Panahi for "acting against national security." He was given a prison sentence and banned from making films for twenty years. 

Format:  DVD
Runtime: 126 minutes
Type:  Drama / Political
Language:  In Farsi with English subtitles