The Circle was a multiple award-winner at the Venice Film Festival in 2000.

A tour de force, The Circle depicts the plight of several Iranian women oppressed solely for being born female in a male-dominant society. In displaying the struggle of these women, filmmaker Jafar Panahi's harrowing tale was banned from screens in Iran for its supposed dissident content.

The women of The Circle are interchangeable - three newly released from prison, another who abandons her daughter to strangers and a prostitute arrested for being found in a car with an unknown man. These women, each in very different situations, are linked not through an interweaving story but through the similar struggles they face in being alone in Iran without a male to vouch for them.

Each woman is suffering from the same battle as the next, says Panahi when explaining the relevance of the title: “(It's) as if each woman could replace another in a circle, making them all the same.”

With this stark simplicity, The Circle makes a profound and lasting statement.

Jafar Panahi is a guest of the festival and wil introduce the sesion on Sunday 30 July, 1pm at RMIT Capitol Theatre.