‘Offside’: the sports movie banned from being shown in its own country
The sports movie has a certain set of tropes and archetypes that the majority of them adhere to, whether they’re based on true stories or entirely fictional creations. However, a film that dared to go against the political grain ended up being banned in its own country, which at least did nothing to stop it from becoming an international success.
The film was semi-autobiographical in nature, too, with co-writer and director Jafar Panahi using the experience of his own daughter to inspire 2006’s Offside. In the Iranian filmmaker’s nation, women are banned from attending men’s sporting events and vice versa, but his child nonetheless managed to surreptitiously join the crowd at a football game.
The narrative revolves around a group of women attempting to gain access to Tehran’s Azadi Stadium so they can watch a pivotal 2006 World Cup qualifier between Iran and Bahrain. Unfortunately, several of them end up being caught and detained, where they’re placed under an armed guard. One of the soldiers does show a degree of sympathy, though, watching the match through a peephole and informing the captives of how the action is unfolding.
Even though Offside was partially shot on location inside a stadium, the local authorities refused to let it be screened in Iran. As Panahi explained to Al Jazeera, the film was merely the latest entry in a filmography that explored the realities of modern Iranian life, even when it depicts actions that were forbidden by the ruling regime.
“Most of my films talk about restrictions imposed on human beings, and here women are more restricted than men. So I used soccer as a means to show the restrictions,” he said. “I chose the title since the term is a punitive measure for trying to score illegally, and the girls in my film are also trying to get into the stadium illegally.”
Offside was the recipient of widespread acclaim and won the ‘Silver Bear’ at the Berlin International Film Festival, but nobody in Iran was able to discover for themselves how the movie had turned out. There was a glimmer of hope that the ban would be lifted given ongoing events, but it proved to be short-lived.
In 2019, Iranian authorities allowed a limited number of women to attend a football game for the first time since the 1979 revolution, before restrictions were imposed again three years later. However, in December 2023, 3,000 women were welcomed to the Azadi Stadium – where parts of Offside were set – to witness the local derby between Persepolis and Esteghlal.
There’s still a long way to go, and it’s clear in the numbers that women are eager to attend sporting events, but it was decreed that Offside showing its characters disguising themselves to gain entry wasn’t the type of message the authorities wanted to be showcased to a wide audience.
