THE TRAVELER Persian Film Fest Screening with additional Short

Saturday 24. January at 15:00 - 16:35

FOMO Secret Cinema, Tbilisi

January 24 is Kiarostami Saturday - proudly presented as part of our extended Persian Film Fest at FOMO Secret Cinema.

Film 1: THE TRAVELER | Abbas Kiarostami | 1974 | Iran | 83 minutes | original Persian audio with English subtitles.

THE TRAVELER follows Qassem Julayi, a restless schoolboy living in a provincial Iranian town who will do whatever it takes to see his favourite team play in a football match in Tehran. Lacking money and adult support, he lies, cheats, and steals to fund his journey. His determination is single minded and emotionally closed off. As the film progresses, Qassem’s pursuit of pleasure reveals how ambition can detach a child from responsibility and empathy.

The film belongs to the first wave of the Persian New Wave, when directors began using children as central figures to explore social pressure, inequality, and moral development . Kiarostami avoids sentimental framing and refuses to correct or punish Qassem directly. Instead, the film observes how a society shaped by scarcity and hierarchy quietly produces this behavior.

THE TRAVELER is often described as one of the most unsparing portraits of childhood in Iranian cinema. Its ending is deliberately unresolved and uncomfortable. Rather than offering redemption, the film shows how desire and disappointment coexist, even at a young age. For viewers interested in how post revolutionary Iranian cinema examined responsibility before ideology fully took hold, THE TRAVELER remains essential.

Film 2: THE BREAD AND ALLEY (SHORT) | Abbas Kiarostami | 1970 | Iran | 11 minutes

The important precursor to The Traveler where Kiarostami fine-tuned his craft before writing and directing his later feature.

Location: FOMO Secret Cinema, Bazari Orbeliani, Tbilisi. A five minute walk from Liberty Square metro

How to find FOMO: Enter the Bazari via Atoneli St above Carrefour and take the stairs on your left behind the jewellery stand. One flight up. Video instructions here

FOMO Secret Cinema • Bazari Orbeliani, 0102 Tbilisi, Georgia

Google Map of Bazari Orbeliani, 0102 Tbilisi, Georgia

FOMO Cinema

+995591100216

fomocinematbilisi@gmail.com

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