‘The Seed of the Sacred Fig’ is an abrasive, bludgeoning, ferociously sharp rendering of a culture and an ideology in crisis, and the way the forces of reaction collide with a younger generation’s call for freedom, with devastating consequences. In Tehran a dutiful civil servant Iman (Misagh Zare) is promoted to the role of investigating judge, which means he is responsible for investigating and prosecuting any civilian found guilty of protest or insubordination, and in so doing he sets himself apart from his daughters who become increasingly hostile to his unconditional loyalty to a regime which has ruined the life of one of their best friends who is beaten up and then mysteriously disappears.

Covert attempts to make enquiries into the whereabouts of Sadaf (Niousha Akhshi) turn the finger of suspicion back on Iman’s wife and daughters in a film which had to be made secretly with the director fleeing the country that has sentenced him to imprisonment, a fine and flogging. His wife Najmeh (Soheila Golestani) is caught in the middle of conflicting societal forces, which has been set in motion by the family’s relocation to a more prosperous home, but at a price as their daughters now have to restrict their access to social media.

What results is that they turn to illicit, prohibited forms of social media usage on their phones, which sees them in receipt of footage of student protests with the authorities beating up those who take part. A battle of wills is then set up, which takes on an intense psychological force when the father’s gun goes missing – itself an offence which could see him sent to prison, with his reputation in tatters.

The film is a full blown political conspiracy thriller by this time, interspersed with actual scenes shot on phones of the insurrection on the streets. It’s obvious that the way Iman treats his wife and daughters is an allegory for an authoritarian and theocentric regime, where, the argument goes, God doesn’t change, and so neither must the country and its values. Without giving too much away it is clear that the director, Mohammad Rasoulof, is hoping that the government will collapse. The cat and mouse chase element at the end, where a father is effectively hunting down his family and they in turn are defending themselves against him, is an audacious and symbolical moment in a claustrophobic and heart pumping tragedy.