[6] His family has been involved in dissident politics in Iran: his father was imprisoned by the Shah's regime in the 1950s, and his sister Maryam under the revolutionary government of Ayatollah Khomeini in the 1980s.

He is married to Paola Gourley, an Italian-English lawyer working in London,[7] who gave birth to their first child in October 2009 shortly after his release from prison.

[9] Soon after, Bahari made his first film, The Voyage of the Saint Louis, about the attempt by 937 German Jewish refugees to escape Nazi Germany on that ship in 1939, who were turned away by Cuba, the United States, and Canada, and ultimately forced to return to the Third Reich.

[12] He has produced a number of other documentaries and news reports for Channel 4, BBC and other broadcasters around the world on subjects as varied as private lives of Ayatollahs, African architecture, Iranians' passion for football and contemporary history of Iran.

"In a country known for neorealist fiction films that focus on small events in the lives of individuals, the work of Iranian director Maziar Bahari is somewhat anomalous.

Representing a new generation of young Iranian filmmakers, Bahari's trenchant looks at social issues in his country have brought both controversy and international acclaim.

[15] In September 2009, Bahari was nominated by Desmond Tutu for the Prince of Asturias Award for Concord, widely known as Spain's Nobel Prize.

[17] On the morning of June 21, 2009, during the 2009 Iranian presidential election protests, Bahari was arrested at his family's home in Tehran and taken to Evin Prison.

(Bahari provided such a list shortly before he was interviewed by Jason Jones[31] a "correspondent" of The Daily Show, who dressed up as a spy as a joke for the story.

[31] In interviews Bahari stated that his interrogator told him not to talk about what happened to him in prison, as the Revolutionary Guards have "people all around the world and they can always bring me back to Iran in a bag".

IranWire works with a number of prominent Iranian journalists including Shima Shahrabi, Aida Ghajar, Shaya Goldoust, Ehsan Mehrabi and Masih Alinejad.

[36] After his release, Bahari launched a complaint against Iranian government's English satellite channel, Press TV, for filming and airing an interview with him under duress.

Ofcom added that filming and broadcasting the interview without consent "while he was in a sensitive situation and vulnerable state was an unwarranted infringement of Mr Bahari's privacy".

[2][40] Doug Saunders of The Globe and Mail called the book "Moving and, at times, very funny", and said that it "offers a number of lessons about the way Middle Eastern politics work.

"[41] Leslie Scrivener of The Toronto Star explained "Then They Came for Me is a gripping story that weaves his family's history of incarceration by Iranian rulers with his own.