Is "Nobody Knows About Persian Cats" a real documentary or a fictional film?

It is a narrative fiction film, but Ghobadi shot it in seventeen days using real Tehran musicians playing fictionalized versions of themselves, giving it a strong documentary feel. The bands and the underground scene it depicts were genuine.

Koja bebinam filmo ba zirnevis farsi ya doble?

The film streams on K-Time with original Persian audio. English subtitles are available. There is no Persian dub — the original Farsi dialogue is the authentic version Ghobadi intended.

What kind of music is in "Kasi Az Gorbehaye Irani Khabar Nadareh"?

The film features a wide range of styles — indie rock, underground rap, jazz, and traditional Persian folk — reflecting the real diversity of Tehran's secret music scene in the late 2000s.

Filme irani hast ya joint production?

It is an Iranian production directed by Bahman Ghobadi and filmed entirely in Tehran. The cast is made up of Iranian musicians and actors. It premiered at Cannes in 2009 and won the Un Certain Regard special jury prize.

Kasi Az Gorbehaye Irani Khabar Nadareh (2009)

Name: Kasi Az Gorbehaye Irani Khabar Nadareh
Genre: Comedy, Drama
Released: 2009
Duration: 106 min
Cast: Negar Shaghaghi, Ashkan Koshanejad, Hamed Behdad, Babak Mirzakhani, Kosh Mirzahi

Director: Bahman Ghobadi

Cast: Negar Shaghaghi, Ashkan Koshanejad, Hamed Behdad, Babak Mirzakhani, Kosh Mirzahi

"Kasi Az Gorbehaye Irani Khabar Nadareh" (Nobody Knows About Persian Cats) is a 2009 Iranian drama-comedy directed by Bahman Ghobadi, following two young Tehran musicians who dream of performing abroad — a portrait of creative longing under restriction, shot with guerrilla urgency inside a city that rarely lets its artists breathe.

What is Kasi Az Gorbehaye Irani Khabar Nadareh about?

Negar and Ashkan are indie musicians in Tehran who have just been released from a short stint in custody. Determined to perform at a concert in London, they set out to assemble a band — an odyssey that pulls them through basements, rooftops, and hidden rehearsal spaces across the city. Each stop introduces a new musician: a metal guitarist who farms cows to fund his gear, a rapper working odd jobs, folk singers who rehearse in secret. Alongside their musical search runs an equally urgent race to secure the documents and permissions needed to leave Iran legally. Ghobadi weaves these two quests together, capturing a community of young artists who refuse to be silent even when performance is effectively forbidden.

The K-Time take

Ghobadi shot the film over seventeen days with a largely non-professional cast playing versions of themselves, which gives the picture an intimacy and documentary honesty that formal productions rarely achieve. The music — spanning indie rock, rap, jazz, and Persian folk — does genuine expressive work, not mere soundtrack decoration. The result is a film that functions both as an affectionate portrait of Tehran's underground scene and as a quietly devastating account of what creative freedom costs.

Cast & crew

Bahman Ghobadi, the Kurdish-Iranian director behind "Turtles Can Fly" and "A Time for Drunken Horses", brings his signature observational style to the Tehran underground. Negar Shaghaghi and Ashkan Koshanejad — musicians in real life — anchor the film with unguarded naturalism. Hamed Behdad, one of Iran's most versatile performers, appears in a key supporting turn alongside Babak Mirzakhani.

Context & significance

For diaspora Iranians who came of age watching a vibrant underground music culture fight for space, this film lands with particular force. It documents a real network of bands — jazz, metal, indie, rap — that existed in Tehran apartments and farmyard rehearsals, invisible to official culture but very much alive. Ghobadi captures the specific texture of that life: the coded phone calls, the borrowed equipment, the perpetual negotiation between artistic need and bureaucratic reality. For viewers who left Iran partly because that negotiation became too exhausting, the film is both a time capsule and a reminder of what persists.

Where & how to watch

"Nobody Knows About Persian Cats" is available on K-Time with original Persian audio and English subtitles. Stream it on the web, on your TV, or on your phone — no VPN needed, no geo-blocking, cancel anytime.