The Cinema of Kabul

From the Archives: World Press Photo contest 2022

Gul Mohammed, who works as an usher in the Ariana Cinema in Kabul, Afghanistan, poses for a photograph on 4 November 2021, nearly three months after the Taliban closed the cinema.

Culture can also be a casualty of war. Following the Taliban takeover of Afghanistan in August 2021, the government-owned Ariana Cinema in Kabul remained closed, its staff in limbo, waiting to hear whether the Taliban would allow films to be screened. Male staff still arrive for work daily, in the hope they will eventually be paid, but Asita Ferdous - the cinema's first female director - was not allowed in. In early 2022, the cinema remained closed, and women were no longer allowed to be employed there