A couple of little kids (a brother and sister) living in Kabul of Afghanistan save a dog-said to be belonging to foreigners-from some children who want to harm him, and refer to the city’s prison. The prison guard tells them that visiting hours are over but they claim that they are not visitors but prisoners. The guard asks why they are outside the prison and the kids say: “We are night prisoners.” After a physical inspection they are taken to the cell and it becomes clear that in fact it is their mother who is a prisoner and since her kids have no place to stay they have been permitted to stay with their mother at nights.

The next day when the prison superintendent finds out, they are refused entry to the prison and beg in vain to be let in. They are told that the prison is not an orphanage or shelter for homeless people but it is where criminals are kept. So in order to have a shelter to live they try to commit a crime…

Cast:
Gol Ghoti: Girl
Zahed: Boy
Twiggy: Dog
Agheleh Rezaii: Mother
Sohrab Akbari: Guard Atef
Jamil Ghanizadeh: Angry guard
Agheleh Shamsollah: Female guard
Razeddin Sayyar: Mad old man
Maydeh Gol: Grandmother
Ghomri Valad Amir: Woman with burka
Shah Mahmood Golbahari: Rosary seller
Emameddin Vakil: Movie ticket seller
Akhtar Abdolaziz: Cart owner


Crew

Written and Directed by: Marziyeh Meshkini
Assistants Director: Kaveh Moeinfar
Hana Makhmalbaf
Set Designer: Akbar Meshkini
Script Supervisor: Zahra Kamalian

Director of Photography: Ebrahim Ghafouri
Camera assistants: Reza Sheikhi
Mehdi Amiri
Sound: Farrokh Fadaei
Sound Assistant: Farid Pirayesh

Post production sound engineer: Hossein Mahdavi
Editor: Mastaneh Mohajer
Mix: Behrooz Shahamat
Music: Mohamad Reza Darvishi
Executive Manager: Mohammad Ahmadi
Fakhruddin Ayyam

Digital post-production: Rasaneh Pooya Co.
Lab: Filmsaz Co.
Still photography & Produced by: Maysam Makhmalbaf
Production: Makhmalbaf Film House / Wild Bunch
Production Date: 2003 Kabul, Afghanistan
Running time: 93 minutes
Colour, 35 mm

International Sales: Wild Bunch (France)

International Awards:

Last year I accompanied Samira Makhmalbaf to Afghanistan as assistant director. We looked everywhere to spot actors and locations.
One day in a women’s prison I met a woman who kept her children with herself in her cell because she had no one outside to take care of them. Her crime was that she had gotten married twice. Her first husband had one day disappeared and she had waited for years for him to return but all news were indicative of his death. The lonely woman without anyone to support her was forced to marry a second man to have someone take care of them. After one year the second husband had also been killed in the unsafe environment of Afghanistan and by then the woman’s first husband had returned and he had his wife imprisoned on charge of adultery…