At the height of the protests following Iran’s controversial presidential election this summer, a young woman named Neda Soltani was shot and killed on the streets of Tehran. Her death — filmed on a cameraphone, then uploaded to the Web — quickly became an international outrage, and Soltani became the face of a powerful movement that threatened the hardline government’s hold on power. With the help of a unique network of correspondents in and out of the country, FRONTLINE investigates the life and death of the woman whose image remains a potent symbol for those who want to keep the reform movement alive.
The film also explores a number of unanswered questions in the aftermath of the greatest upheaval in Iran since the 1979 revolution: How many were arrested and killed as the security forces attempted to contain the growing protest movement? To what extent was the presidential vote manipulated? What is the nature of the reported divisions among Iran’s ruling elites?