Joy in Iran
Clowns, borders, and a charming little animated title sequence.
Joy in Iran is a feature documentary by Bavarian filmmaker Walter Steffen, and it’s exactly the kind of project that reminds you why film exists in the first place. The film follows three artists from “Clowns Without Borders” — Susie Wimmer, Andreas Schock and Moni Single — on their performance tour through Iran, bringing laughter to orphanages, hospitals, psychiatric clinics and refugee camps. Konzept-und-dialog It’s funny, moving, and quietly radical in the way it reveals a deeply human side of a country that Western media tends to flatten into a headline.
The film had its world premiere at the Fünf Seen Filmfestival in Starnberg in September 2018 and was released in German cinemas in January 2019.
Our Part in It
Arne was brought on to create the animated title sequence for the film — and film critics praised it as a charming, detail-rich animation that traces the clowns’ journey from the Munich suburbs, through the S-Bahn, all the way to their plane landing in Iran. Artechock It sets the tone perfectly: warm, witty, and full of the kind of handcrafted personality that makes you lean in before the documentary footage has even begun.
The sequence was created together with longtime collaborator Tobias Pinegger — the same duo behind the NIVEA animatics — and it’s a lovely example of how a small piece of animation can do a lot of storytelling work in very little time.
Director Walter Steffen had previously worked with Arne on two other documentary films — Happy Welcome and Fahr ma obi am Wasser — and his trust in Arne’s work clearly carried over. As he put it himself: “Arne made animations for these films that absolutely upvalued them. His work always exceeded my expectations.”
Credits
- Distribution: Jan Heilig, Kia Ahrndsen
- Director & Writer: Walter Steffen
- Animation: Arne Hain & Tobias Pinegger
- Camera: Steffen Mühlstein, Christoph Grabner
- Editing: Benedikt Mühle
- Music: Wolfgang Olbrecht
- Sound: Wolfgang Olbrecht
- Production: Konzept+Dialog Medienproduktion Walter Steffen / Filmbit Filmproduktion GmbH
- Funding: FilmFernsehFonds Bayern (FFF Bayern)