“A Mother’s Sorrow,” a film released by outspoken Iranian dissident Mohammad Nourizad in December 2014, portrays the struggle of Iranian mothers whose children have lost their lives in the fight for a free Iran. The film follows the family of Saeed Zeinali, a student activist who has been missing since his arrest by Iranian security forces in July 1999. In his interviews with Zeinali’s parents and siblings, Nourizad sheds light on the hardships inflicted on the family over the past 15 years and spotlights their refusal to abandon hope of seeing their son again. In their demands for answers from the Iranian government, the family has been joined by Golnar Eshghi, whose son Sattar Beheshti was killed after his arrest in October 2012; Shahnaz Akmali, whose son Mostafa Karim Beigi was shot dead by Iranian security forces in December 2009; and the Mourning Mothers of Laleh Park, a group of women who have lost their loved ones as a result of government repression since the establishment of the Islamic Republic.
