Persepolis(2007)
dir. Marjane Satrapi & Vincent Paronnaud
Her own memoir, animated — testimony, not reportage.
Where to watch: Rent or buy on Apple TV, Amazon Video, or Fandango at Home — no subscription option currently.Letterboxd ↗
Animated adaptation of Satrapi's own graphic memoir — a girl coming of age in Tehran during and after the 1979 revolution, then in exile, then back home as an adult reckoning with who she's become.
Why it’s here
Satrapi adapted her own story, so nothing here is secondhand. Punk in the plainest sense: the Iranian government denounced it, and she made it anyway. Pedagogical in that it teaches a kid what authoritarianism actually feels like to live through — not the textbook timeline, the daily compromises.
Where This Film Lives
- Setting
- Iran
Companion Viewing In
Read Alongside
Books that share a topic, theme, or setting with this film.
Persepolis
Marjane Satrapi
Rebellion drawn in black ink.
✦ READ – REFLECT → RESIST
Everything Sad Is Untrue (a true story)
Daniel Nayeri
A refugee kid tells stories to survive.
✦ READ – REFLECT → RESIST
Reading Lolita in Tehran
Azar Nafisi
Seven women. Forbidden books. The Republic outside.
✦ READ – REFLECT → RESIST
All the Shah's Men
Stephen Kinzer
The CIA overthrew Iran's democracy. For oil.
✦ READ – REFLECT → RESIST
Disoriental
Négar Djavadi
Three generations who outlasted two regimes.
✦ READ – REFLECT → RESIST
Lipstick Jihad
Azadeh Moaveni
Iranian American, going back to find out what that is.
✦ READ – REFLECT → RESIST
Autocracy, Inc.: The Dictators Who Want to Run the World
Anne Applebaum
The network behind every strongman.
✦ READ – REFLECT → RESIST
Darius the Great Is Not Okay
Adib Khorram
Half-Iranian, depressed, going to Iran. He finds himself there.
✦ READ – REFLECT → RESIST