It Was Just an Accident is a drama best approached with as little prior knowledge as possible. Panahi tells the story of a group of people whose lives intersect because of a car accident, exploring the decisions they make under the shadow of past traumas. The film reveals the scars that the oppression and the violence of the Islamic Republic has left on ordinary lives, showing no part of society has been spared. In a country where human life has been so devalued for the sake of the regime’s continuity, and torture normalized, perhaps nothing is ever truly just an accident.

Throughout his career, dissident filmmaker Jafar Panahi has addressed human rights violations in the Islamic Republic of Iran in many of his films. Since 2010, he had been banned from traveling abroad due to sentences imposed on him for opposing the regime, spending his days under house arrest while seeking creative ways to keep making cinema. With his new film It Was Just an Accident, selected for the main competition at this year’s Cannes Film Festival, Panahi was able to attend an international festival for the first time in years and received in person the Palme d’Or.

Cannes 2025

Palme d'or

Sydney 2025

Sydney Film Prize