The story in The Malta Independent on Sunday last week about the shooting of a film, Mona’s Dream, led to a certain amount of international reactions and other unsuspected links to Malta.

Originally, the story as it appeared on The Malta Independent on Sunday, appeared on an Iranian blog, but some of its main assertions – that it will be a $10 million feature film, as well as the link to Mel Gibson’s Icon Productions film company are non-existent.

Nor has it been decided whether the film will be shot in Malta.

However, another Malta link surfaced as a result of the international reaction to the story: it turns out that Maltese film director Mario Philip Azzopardi, well-known locally for his 1972 cinematic rendition of Frans Sammut’s novel Il-Gagga, might direct the film, that is, if enough financing is found to enable the production of the film.

This will be a low budget movie, Mr Azzopardi told The Malta Independent on Sunday, “certainly not the $10 million that the article speaks about. Preliminary estimates place it in the $6 million region.”

Mr Azzopardi also wrote the script for the film.

At this point, various locations are being sought for the shooting of the film, and Malta is among these locations, but may not be chosen because costs in Malta are very high compared to locations in Bosnia or Algeria.

Mr Azzopardi said he would like the film to be shot in Malta, in which case, he will be employing some 40 actors from Malta.

Mona’s Dream is a feature film, the film’s website (www.monasdream.com) tells the story of Mona Mahmudnizhad and her family. Mona was 16 years old when she was arrested in the Iranian city of Shiraz along with scores of other Baha’is. The Islamic Republic of Iran, under the leadership of Ayatollah Khomeini, had set out to rid their country and their revolution of the Baha’i Community, the largest religious minority in Iran.

Mona and her family were victims of their cruel and intolerant persecution. She and her father were arrested on 22 October 1982 and suffered intense psychological and physical torture for several months. Yadu’llah, her father, was executed on 12 March 1983 and Mona and nine of her female companions were executed on 18 June 1983 by hanging. Mona’s mother, Farkhundeh, spent five months in the same prison as her husband and her daughter while her other daughter, Taraneh, worked tirelessly to have her family freed.

The film chronicles the courage and bravery of Mona, her father and her companions as they faced the irrational hatred of Iran’s fanatical clergy. Filmmaker Jack Lenz made a video in 1985 called Mona with the Children that was a modest commercial success and told the story in five minutes about Mona. Written and sung by Doug Cameron, the song and video travelled around the world, raising awareness on the precarious situation of the beleaguered community of Baha’is in Iran. Since then, the threat to freedom and conscience have increased considerably in Iran and in many other countries around the globe.

Jack is now asking that young people everywhere arise to do what Mona asked us to do. To gather together and create unity. Allow young people to have a voice, especially young women and girls, and to create service projects in Mona’s name around the world.

He wants to show the Iranian regime and other repressive governments that youth can move the world to justice, compassion and the right of expression of their conscience … their right to speak.

Mona’s ‘crimes’ ranged from “misleading children and youth” (she was teaching children who had been expelled from school for their beliefs and serving in an orphanage) to being a ‘Zionist’ even though the only reason the Baha’i World Centre is in Israel is because Baha’ullah, the founder of the Baha’i Faith, was exiled to Palestine a century before by the same fanatical clergy of Iran.

She and her companions were never given a fair trial or right to a lawyer or legal defence. If they did not convert to Islam, they would be killed and there was no other reason for their detention, torture, interrogations and finally their execution. There were no crimes, no fair trials and no way for them to speak out. This film will give them their voice, will let them tell their story. Their only crime was their conscience, their beliefs and their way of life. They died for their freedom to believe and they would not lie about their choices.

Their mass grave in Shiraz contains their bodies, not their souls, and despite the fact that their families were never allowed to give them a proper burial, a rosebush grows over their grave and is a powerful testament to their beauty of character and their fearless courage.