Shatranj-e Baad (Chess of the Wind). 1976. Iran. Directed by Mohammad Reza Aslani. Courtesy Janus Films. NEW YORK, NY.- Following on the success of the landmark MoMA exhibition Iranian Cinema before the Revolution, 1925-1979 and the astonishing recent rediscovery of Mohammad Reza Aslani’s Chess of the Wind (1976), the Museum presents a retrospective of the filmmaker’s work-14 newly preserved dramas and documentaries, some never before screened-that deepens our appreciation of this unsung master. A darkly claustrophobic tale of familial greed, cruelty, and subterfuge, Chess of the Wind proudly displayed its 19th-century roots in Henrik Ibsen and Fyodor Dostoevsky even as it hinted unsettlingly at the corruption and moral turpitude of Iran’s Pahlavi regime. Ignored by audiences and critics following its only screening at the Tehran International Film Festival in 1976, the film disappeared for some 40 years until Aslani’s son, by some improbable miracle, found the negative in a flea market outside Tehran. Thanks to a restoration in 2020 by the Film Foundation and Cineteca di Bologna, Chess of the Wind is widely recognized as a masterpiece of Iranian cinema, tantalizing us with more riches yet to be unearthed.