American director signs petition calling on Iran to release Jafar Panahi
Jafar Panahi, the great Iranian director behind such films as Crimson Gold and The White Balloon—if you haven't seen them, time to update the Netflix queue—was taken from his home on March 1st and imprisoned for non-specific charges. Since then, specific charges involving making a film against the government. That's a big deal in Iran, particularly for a filmmaker whose films have been banned in his home country for 10 years who's been arrested before.
