Hospitality and Culture at Snowy Peaks and Dry Valleys

Iran – Durch meine Augen (2018)

Dokumentation von Andi Rohde

Great music seems to be something connecting and can be found all around the globe. Starting from basements in the Baltics to Spitzbergen in the North to Nairobi in the South and Mexico in the West. Going more East, a German drummer and YouTuber made a whole 90-minutes documentary about the Iran and its musicians.

In the beginning, filmmaker Andi Rohde tells how he realized, that not many can see the beauty of this country, as he was standing in front of the Golestan Palace. Luckily, he decided to sit down and edit all his material into this movie. The Drums&Percussion magazine made an article about him as well as the Rock Hard, for which he put a clip online about the Metal Festival in Teheran, and right in the current issue, his name is in a review about his band Ohrenfeindt.

The film covers many aspects of the Iran, its nature, cities and culture and conventions. The two week journey starts with snowboarding and a hike at the feet of the mighty Damavand. Before heading south to Qeshm, he meets and jams with a bunch of young guys. He experiences the Valley of Stars and a construction site of the traditional Lenj. One of the most touching moments Andi recalls is when a boy is just happy to show the city Yazd from above.

In Isfahan he presents the Naghsh-e-Jahan Square and Si-o-se Pol, where he witnesses more live music and important messages: “We are not free”. At the fire temple, he captures some time-lapses. Generally the camera work might not be perfect but Andi manages to make it a round story line, with adding Google Earth animations, Pictures and especially a wonderful off-text, that gives a lot of background information and due to his voice and narrative style is great to listen to.

More musicians he meets are a guy playing Bob Dylan, a multi-instrumentalist playing the Tombak and clay drum at a music store, the Setar at the Zayanderud and the trombone in an orchestra, and another one playing the Ney at the Tabatabai House. So while sometimes ‘amateur documentaries’ are a mere sequence of raw footage, Andi Rohde gives a very personal insight on the friendly people and beautiful country he obviously is happy to talk about.

If you are interested, you can get the documentary as DVD or stream from Andi directly: Andi@Andi-Rohde.de