30 Animated Movies That Are Not for Children

Adapted from Marjane Satrapi’s graphic novel of the same name, Persepolis is an unusually faithful representation of its source, but that’s in no small part due to the fact that Satrapi herself directed the film with Vincent Paronnaud, and that it’s based on her own experiences.

Presented in black and white with flashes of colour (used in a similar way as Spielberg deploys colour in Schindler’s List), Persepolis takes us with a young “Marji” to Tehran, showing us how her life, liberties, and middle-class family come into conflict with the turbulent political situation in Iran. We are with her during the Iranian revolution, when the victory of fundamentalism changes Iranian women’s lives forever. We are with her when the Iran-Iraq war again alters the face and shape of the country and curtails her liberties further. And we are with her as she rebels against her upbringing, is sent away to Vienna, thrown out of school, and attempts suicide.

Though the film’s aesthetic and narrative are true to the graphic novel, it manages to expand on the material by literally bringing it to life on screen. This fills in the gaps between panels and letting us understand how Marji moves and interacts with her environment, making her more of a girl than the page could and bringing us even deeper into the meaning of her story.