SDG-5; gender inequality and discrimination, by shedding light on the violence faced by Iranian women by Iran’s ‘morality’ police.

Gender-inequality is often wrongly excused as a cultural ‘norm’, which is untrue; it’s seen across countries like Iran, Afghanistan and America.

By showing the commonality of a girl’s life in Iran, and her refusal to be docile – it allows a global audience to understand that this is not an ‘accepted’ norm for those women.

RISE showcases ‘gender’ discrimination as an injustice that our everyday heroine fights with fierce ferocity; and that same ferocity is demanded of you, our global audience.

In the winter of 2022 Iran erupted after the 'morality police' killed Mahsa Jina Amini for her improper headscarf, a female-led resistance in Iran was born.

By February 2023, the regime stated it had arrested tens of thousands of protesters.

Iranian artists, rappers, creatives, have been arrested and executed for their creative activism.

Consequently, the topic in the film is VERY risky for Iranians to openly create.

Hence RISE is a worldfirst; never-before have Iran's 'morality police' been shown killing a girl in a film.

This means there were real sacrifices involved in the making of RISE - many of the Iranian creatives involved have exiled themselves from ever returning to see their families in Iran again, and this was a heavy emotional decision. And there is risk of retribution.

Consequently, the female Writer-Director, who is a dual national of the UK and Iran, has remained anonymous and is using an alias. However, she felt it crucial to tell this story - no matter the personal cost.

The Iranian creatives gathered first-hand accounts from refugees to reflect their true stories, and also the murder of Mahsa Jina Amini.

Political female refugees starred in the leading roles and EP’d the project, refugees also consulted on the script, giving these women a voice and a platform was an important part in conveying the overall message of the film.

Which contributed to Goal 5 of the UN's sustainability goals; to achieve gender equality and empowerment, by “empowering the voices of Iranian women”

And never-before have Iran's 'morality police' been shown killing a girl in a film.

It was important to take on this storytelling challenge – as films have the power to humanize complex issues, evoking empathy by putting the viewer in the shoes of the protagonist.

And in this case the story was a real.

In the first few months of the protests, a lot of first-hand cell-phone recorded footage was coming from inside of Iran.

However, after harsh crackdowns on #WomanLifeFreedom protestors, 500 people killed, including 69 children, 20,000+ protestors arrested - Iranians became too scared to continue filming content.

By February 2023 the conversation had begun to die down.

RISE was made by the Iranian women and refugees in the diaspora, to revive the conversation in a new and fresh way that grabbed the attention of a global audience who were fatigued and no longer engaged.

With the silencing of their families and people inside of the country, the creatives felt it was a moral obligation to step in and to align themselves with a brand that focused on women’s issues.

The brand/foundation’s values are to “accelerate progress through campaigns that draw attention to issues that hold back girls and women.”

The brief was originally prescriptive in style, and it had been to create “short-form documentary-style content drawing from first-hand accounts, in a film that could be used on social channels to draw attention to Iranian Women’s rights on International Women’s Day.”

However, the Iranian Creatives worked on a new strategy. It was clear that International Women’s Day would be over-saturated for comms, so instead the new plan became to launch on Iranian New Year, Nowruz, which was at the end of March.

And to create a style that broke with the brands previous reportage docu-style comms, to instead target the arts.

Consequently, this was the brand’s most successful campaign ever, drawing the attention of global names in film, activism and the arts. Featuring in global entertainment outlets and news channels.

For prolonged periods there were complete internet black-out inside Iran, attempting to stop the #WomanLifeFreedom message continuing.

And for decades, social-media platforms like, facebook, twitter, tiktok, youtube have been banned in Iran. Civilian calls are intercepted. Instead Iranian people use encrypted-chat-services like Telegram and Signal in fear of interception.

Never-before have Iran's 'morality police' been shown killing a girl in a film.

The Iranian community uploaded RISE on encrypted channels to elude the reach of the IRGC, to circulate inside the country and globally.

The diaspora mobilised using the film as a tool for activism. This film was owned by the entire community, not just the foundation. Eg. in July when there was a push to proscribe the IRGC as a terrorist-organisation, outside the UK foreign office RISE screened to audiences to gather signatures for an open-letter, and VOA (Voice of America), live streamed the screening.

“Made by us, a group of Iranian women, to show the world our never-dying spirit of resistance. Drawing on real-life accounts of female refugees abused by the morality-police, RISE shows a girl resisting arrest, which leads to her murder, echoing the truths of countless women who have had their lives stolen.

All the while, the most iconic feminist poem of all time, Maya Angelou’s poem ‘Still I rise’ is read.

It depicts a poetic beauty in our rage and in our hope. Our girls may have died fighting, but their fire lives-on through us, their fire lives on through our movement.

By showing the audience someone they can feel and touch, our heroine reflects Mahsa, Nika , Sarina, and all the lion women of iran who were killed, but from her lifeless body flowers grow, and butterflies are born, to symbolise our collective-resistance, our fire, living on.”

Huge crackdown on #WomanLifeFreedom protestors, 20,000+ arrested, 500 killed - slowed content coming from Iran.

And the global world was becoming desensitised.

We had to give Iranian women a platform.

The brief:

Tell the story of resistance in a way that keeps the #WomanLifeFreedom conversation going and gives Iranian female creativity a voice.

Enabling Iranian women to be heard.

40k production budget. Zero media spend.

Audience:

Targeting a cross-section of opinion leaders in the Arts & Activism.

Approach:

Iranian female creatives led the creative, the strategy, the writing, refugees interviewed to inform the script - and the story behind their personal-sacrifices and involvement became a part of the social media narrative.

A campaign made by the community, used a tool by the community and driven forward by community outreach.

Launched on the spring equinox, Iranian New Year, to symbolise the spring of a female-revolution.

Partnering with Maya Angelou’s famous poem and her estate also hosted RISE on her instagram platform - to empower of the message of resistance.

Gathered first-hand accounts from Iranian female refugees to create a film that reflected their true stories, and the murder of Mahsa Jina Amini.

Knowing the huge sacrifices of the Iranian creatives choosing to exile themselves to make this film, it was important to centre them in the campaign.

Our massive organic reach over a three month period Variety Magazine, MSNBC News, came from the Iranian community each advocating for the film, by DMing and emailing their contacts directly.

The placement of the film was youtube, instagram and also on Signal & Telegram on encrypted channels to ensure those inside Iran could view and freely without being traced by IRGC authorities.

RISE was for the voices of iranian women to be heard.

We didn’t create RISE to gather data in a neat package, but the reach and awareness is undeniable.

Huge platforms :

MSNBC NEWS with 1.35 million views/

Manoto TV: 40 million+ viewers across Europe & Middle East.

Variety Magazine: 28.5 million unique users per month.

‘BeIransVoice’ screened outside UK ‘Foreign Office where 1700 opinion leaders signed open-letter. Major news outlet VOA (Voice of America) live-streamed screening to their audience of 354 million per week.

Laura Whitmore, Omid Djalili, Oscar-Nominated actress Shoreh Agdashloo shared/posted.

Emmy Award-winning Iranian journalist Ramita Navai, led a panel discussion about RISE, reading out statement from the refugees who consulted on the script.

Human Rights Lawyer, Gissou Nia (who helped remove Iran from U.N. Commission on Status of Women) advocated for RISE on platforms.

A voice was given to the silenced.

In reaction to the stabbing of an Iranian journalist in London in April 2024, a screening of Rise is being organised in the House of Lords in June with the help of Baroness Young to advocate against the reach of the IRGC targeting Woman Life Freedom activists in the UK.

We had qualified for the Oscars and BAFTAs, unfortunately due to a risk to the EP’s family member, her grandparents were called in for questioning inside Iran, she asked us not to submit to the Oscars & BAFTAs despite qualifying.

As our production story also highlights the severity of the attempts to silence Iranian women, we have decided to focus a new off-shoot campaign around the attempts to silence us in our endeavours.

The nature of the production and budget required a ‘skeleton’ crew.

However, during the planning, we were conscious to keep flights down to only cast and crew that were 100% necessary, this even meant compromising by hiring local actors for the part of 'the friend', who weren’t Iranian. And super imposing voices for those extras.

And only 4 key individuals were flown out to the shoot in Spain.

The service provider were passionate about the environment and worked hard to be green and eco-friendly throughout our production process - this meant recycling everything on set, cast and crew walking between locations, the use of LED Lighting, digital call sheets, and storyboards and using existing locations rather than building sets.