No Bears (2022) review

Filmmaker Panahi (playing "himself") is working on a new movie about a couple trying to sneak out of Iran with stolen passports and contemplating smuggling himself out as well to nearby Turkey, and then he finds himself in the middle of a heated predicament in which he's accused of taking a photograph of young lovers Solduz (Amir Davari) and Gozal (Darya Alei) ... except Gozal was "promised" to another man for marriage.  There's a good deal of artistic trickery going on here which would otherwise be off-putting (and the "remote directing" scenes are clumsy) but considering Panahi's situation it makes total sense: he's been arrested more often than any American rapper I can think of and with every project he starts he risks getting snagged by the morality police.  At this point I doubt anyone would blame him for seeking refuge elsewhere, but as recent news clippings have shown, there have been widespread protests following the murder of Mahsa Amini (for supposedly violating the "mandatory hijab law"): the people have had enough.