Panahi’s time in the notoriously brutal Evin prison, where dissidents and political captives are held, inspired him to make “It Was Just an Accident.” In the story, a character named Vahid, damaged by vicious beatings in prison, kidnaps a man he believes to have been his torturer. Driving around Tehran with the captive drugged in the back of a van, Vahid seeks out other former prisoners to confirm the man’s identity and to help decide whether to kill him. (Suspicious bystanders, sensing that something is up, are constantly demanding bribes; at one point, Vahid tells a pair of guards that he has no cash, and they hand him a credit-card reader.)journey-inline-newsletterinline-newsletter