^[1]KANDAHAR, AFGHANISTAN: As a movie director working in Southern Afghanistan, I must deal with a very conservative culture. Once I was making a movie about opium smokers (Aaina-e-ebrath) and I was looking for a good location to film.

Eventually I found a destroyed village that I thought would provide a suitable set for the movie.

I took my team there and we started shooting our first scene. One of our actors was playing the part of a man smoking opium. He squatted amid rubble and trash, holding a bent piece of aluminum foil in one hand and his fix of opium in the other. Four other people squatted around him. They all had dirty clothes and ravenous eyes, like the real addicts I had observed when I was doing research for the movie. The acting was extremely realistic and I was pleased.

Suddenly some 15 people burst on the set and attacked us with bare fists and sticks. They were villagers, old men, boys, and even children. They beat us and cursed us, saying that we were all filthy junkies. I tried to explain that we were just making a movie but they would not listen. One man looked at me menacingly and said: “Where the hell did you find these addicts? And why did you bring them to our village?”

The villagers had never seen anyone shooting a movie and they were convinced that the actors were actually smoking opium. I told the actors to clean their faces and show that they were not real addicts. We all talked with the villagers and tried to explain to them that we meant no harm.

In the end, they realized what was going on but they still told us that we had to leave because their traditional laws say that making movies is forbidden (haram).

Some of our equipment was broken. Our lights technician was holding his bloody hand. What a disaster! Making movies is hard in Afghanistan but I don’t want to give up. Despite the pressure, I think that this kind of work is very important for the development of my country.