Sunday February 11, 2007, at 6:30 PM

Special Guest: Cyrus Kar


A Conversation with Cyrus Kar
and screening of an excerpt from
Cyrus The Great: a work in progress


Cyrus Kar is, a part-time college professor, Los Angeles filmmaker and U.S. Navy veteran who, by virtue of being in the wrong place at the wrong time while filming a documentary about Cyrus The Great in Iraq, was picked up by U.S. military forces and held in solitary confinement at the Camp Cropper detention facility in Iraq for almost two months even after the FBI had cleared him.

Ted Koppel featured Kar in a two-part special on ABC's "Nightline" last year, where Kar described a violent and terrifying ordeal at the hands ofU.S. personnel during his 55-day detention in solitary confinement.

. . .Kar grew up along the West Coast after emigrating from Iran at the age of two. He served in the Navy for three years before earning a bachelor's degree from San Jose State University and a master's degree from Pepperdine University. He had been working on a documentary and manuscript about the
Persian king Cyrus the Great. Kar lacked critical footage of Babylon, Cyrus The Great's most lasting achievement, and entered Iraq only after securing appropriate permits and visas from the U.S. and Iraqi governments and from Kurdish authorities. He has since been trying raise money to finish his
film after suffering a major financial setback resulting from his
detention."


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and

The Stone Garden

A film by:
PARVIZ KIMIAVI



The Stone Garden, the second feature film by Parviz Kimiavi, received The Silver Bear Prize for the best film at Berlin Film Festival in 1976.

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