Inspired by true events, this recent film by one of the masters of the new Iranian cinema is the story of a woman’s attempt to enter pre–September 11 Afghanistan to reach her sister in the Taliban-controlled city of Kandahar. Disguising herself in the required head-to-toe burkha, the expatriate Nafas—a Canadian journalist who fled her native Afghanistan as a teenager—wends her way to the city in the company of a string of Afghan characters, since it is illegal for women to travel alone. Notable for its striking imagery and poetic insights into the struggles of everyday Afghanis under the Taliban rule, Kandahar won the Ecumenical Jury Prize at the Cannes Film Festival.