AT FIVE IN THE AFTERNOON (PANJ E ASR) Beyond Conflict: Focus on the Middle East

The third film from 23-year-old director Samira Mokhmalbaf (THE APPLE, BLACKBOARDS) is set in Afghanistan after the fall of the Taliban. Nogreh wants to be her country’ s first female p resident, but first she has to find a way to attend school.

Nogreh’s father is a devoutly religious man who wants his two daughters to adhere to the traditional female role in Afghan society. Nogreh’s sister nurses her malnourished baby and yearns for the safe return of her husband, a soldier in the army. Nogreh secretly rebels against her father’ s fixed ideas while remaining openly respectful. Her compassionate invitation to a large group of Pakistani refugees sets in motion on exodus across on unforgiving landscape.

Makhmalbaf recruited nonprofessional actors from the streets of Kabul. Beautifully shot on location in the summer and fall of 2002, the film highlights important issues facing a notion under a shadow of poverty and hopelessness.