Told by a diverse team of young filmmakers, including a female director and a half-Iranian female writer, this coming-of-age story depicts Iranian culture, punk subculture, and the struggles of the immigrant experience - all while following a woman protagonist.

SYNOPSIS

It’s 1984. Ro Shirazi (18) listens to punk music through a Walkman, while her father Davood (53), insists on playing a recording of a younger Ro playing the tonbak (Iranian hand drum). He drills her about her academic expectations before dropping her off at a friend’s house for a study group. Ro enters, only to reveal that this is not a study group, but a practice session for a punk band called Heatstroke. Ro adjusts the drum set and briefly showcases her drumming talent before working up the nerve to ask Glenn (21), the frontman, if she can drum on one song at their gig that night. Kent (23), the abrasive drummer, becomes hostile to the idea and accuses her of being a poser. Ro launches into a tirade in which she cuts and dyes her hair blue to try and make herself “punk enough” for the band. Glenn and Anthony (19), the bassist, try to reason with her, but she storms out and skateboards off

 

In a traditionally-styled Iranian-American home, a rage-fueled Ro barges into the Shirazi family’s dinner and debuts her new look, much to the shock of her mother Shiva (40), and sister Fatima (20). Ro defies a furious Davood’s authority by standing up for her right to express herself and calling him out for being oppressive. Ro make a statement and disappears out the front door into the night. Davood finds a crumpled flyer that has fallen out of Ro’s pocket, detailing the location of the gig that night, and goes after her.

 

Ro gets to the venue where Heatstroke is playing and weaves through the rowdy mass of punks. She gets caught in the mosh pit and has a run-in with a group of menacing Skinheads. With the help of a Spiked-Hair Punk, Ro fends them off and climbs onstage just as Heatstroke is about to play. She demands again that they let her drum. The crowd chants in Ro’s favor, pressuring Kent to surrender the drums to Ro. At last, this is Ro’s chance to prove herself - but does she actually have what it takes?

WHY THIS STORY MATTERS

This project is unique because of the time, place, and perspective it is being told from. Not only does the story capture a niche moment in history where punk sprouted in the Northern California suburbs, but it also tells it from a Iranian-American teenage girl’s perspective, under the direction of women behind the camera. Our protagonist’s story is based off of the writer Ariana Skeeland’s mother, who immigrated to the Bay Area in the early eighties at the age of sixteen following the Iranian Revolution. Ariana also loves punk music, which was growing increasingly prominent in Northern California at this time. Ariana thus became inspired to write a film where her culture and her mother’s immigrant experience would coincide with her appreciation of punk.  

At its core, Rogue is a coming of age film that deals with the multifaceted nature of figuring out one’s own identity while caught between two different cultures. The director, Lina Larson, is a first-generation immigrant herself and understands the complexities of balancing parental expectations and American cultural attitudes that oftentimes conflict. The Iranian part of the story is informed by Ariana’s half-Iranian upbringing, through which she understands the customs, culture, ideology, and attitudes, and therefore brings an authentic perspective to the film. Iranian culture is seldom depicted in mainstream film and television, so this short film will contribute to the effort to tell diverse stories in the cinematic medium.

The other half of Rogue’s story follows Ro, the protagonist, as an underdog in a boy’s club, trying to prove her drumming ability to the community she desperately wants to be part of. The music industry is primarily dominated by men, especially in the rock and punk genres. This is a rare and incredibly empowering opportunity to follow a female protagonist in this world, which is what the director, Lina, is so drawn to. This film is made even more unique simply because it depicts a female drummer showcasing her raw talent live within a layered narrative story, making this an indie epic that will get the audience’s blood pumping full of adrenaline. The female writers, producers, and director can relate to the struggle of trying to break into and gain respect in a predominantly male industry, thus making Ro’s journey even more personal to the women involved in the execution of this story.

All in all, this story benefits society because it is told from the viewpoint of a female lead, it showcases the historically underrepresented Iranian culture, it explores the what it means to be a female drummer in a male-dominated punk community, it demonstrates both rebellion and understanding, it illustrates a complicated father-daughter relationship, and it captures the immigrant experience, all in an ultimately uplifting way through themes that ring as true today as they did back in 1984.