Fereydoun Rahnema (Persian: فریدون رهنما; 1930 – 1975) was an Iranian film director and poet.
[2] Shot in studio and on location in the ruins of Persepolis, the film is based on Ferdowsi's poetic epic Shahnameh.
[3] It tells the story of Crown Prince Siâvash who leaves his homeland in order to avoid dishonoring his father Shah Kay Kāvus.
The film is notable for its then-uncommon temporal experimentation with footage of tourists trekking through the ruins of Persepolis interspersed with the older setting.
The film combines this ancient story with documentary-style scenes of foreign tourists visiting the ruins of Persepolis in the present, creating a work in which past, future, present, legend, theater and a myriad of filmic forms are combined in a dense intertextuality that was new to Iranian cinema.