The Cow (گاو, Gaav) Film Screening @ NWFF

Farnoush Djavaheripour, as photographed by Mahsa Alikhani.

Dariush Mehrjui, 1969, Iran
84 min
In Farsi/Persian with English subtitles

Considered to be the originator of Iranian New Wave Cinema, Dariush Mehrjui’s 1969 film The Cow (گاو, Gāav) tells the story of an old villager whose life and livelihood largely revolve around a single cow, and his journey into madness over the loss of everything he has. It offers subtle yet powerful criticisms of socioeconomic systems of wealth, class, and property, drawing from Marxism—Indeed a story as apt for our time as it was for its own.

The Cow was immediately banned by the Shah of Iran because of its negative portrayal of impoverishment in rural Iran. It was later smuggled out of the country and won the FIPRESCI critics prize at the 1971 Venice Film Festival. Despite the film being praised by the Islamic Republic, the current government of Iran who took power after the Shah was overthrown in 1979, Mehrjui found himself later being censored by the new government.

Mehrjui’s Resistance, Assassination, and Legacy

In March 2022, Mehrjui publicly denounced state censorship on film. In front of a filled cinema crowd, Mehrjui announced, “Listen to me, I can’t take it anymore,” he said. “I want to fight. Kill me, do whatever you want with me…destroy me, but I want my right.” Proclaiming he would rather fight and die for his freedom of expression than to continue living under oppression. Just over a year later, he and his wife were stabbed to death. While the official word is that the killing was over a personal grudge, it has been speculated that it is in fact the government who had him assassinated for speaking out.

As a founder of the Iranian New Wave Cinema, Mehrjui paved the way for world renowned directors such as Abbas Kiarostami, director of Taste of Cherry, and Jafar Panahi, director of It Was Just An Accident and The White Balloon, who won the Palme d’Or at the 2025 Cannes Film Festival.