No Bears

"It is a testament to (Panahi's) integrity as an artist that he looks so critically at himself and so empathetically at those who are indifferent to, or might even support, his imprisonment."

"Even as events become oppressive, (Panahi) is still able to conjure stray moments of delight born of humane observations."

"No Bears is a film of rage calmly expressed..."

"Panahi’s literal and metaphorical entrapment feeds into the metatextuality of No Bears."

"The film juggles its layers of story and image very adroitly, with occasional touches of roughness in the digital image only adding to the immediacy."

"No Bears spends less time finding aesthetic articulations of its themes than building out a convoluted plot to support them."

"The currently incarcerated Iranian director delivers... an atypically disillusioned investigation into his own filmmaking ethic."

"Deceptively simple at first, and then accumulating increasingly complex layers by almost imperceptible degrees..."