A documentary that follows one year in the life of American pro basketball player Kevin Sheppard, who signed on to play for the upstart Iranian Super League team A.S. Shiraz.A documentary that follows one year in the life of American pro basketball player Kevin Sheppard, who signed on to play for the upstart Iranian Super League team A.S. Shiraz.A documentary that follows one year in the life of American pro basketball player Kevin Sheppard, who signed on to play for the upstart Iranian Super League team A.S. Shiraz.
- Awards
- 1 nomination
Zoran Majkic
- Self - team member
- (as Zoran)
- Director
- Writer
- All cast & crew
- Production, box office & more at IMDbPro
Storyline
Featured review
Even better documentary than I'd hoped for
I'd never heard of "The Iran Job" but when I saw it listed on a Roku channel, I was immediately intrigued. A former US college basketball player spending a season in Iran??? As a lifelong hoops fan and former newscaster (I got out at the right time), I couldn't resist. As I write this two years later, I've now watched it three times and undoubtedly will watch it again. It is that good.
Short summary: Kevin Sheppard played guard at Jacksonville University, the school that sent Hall of Famer Artis Gilmore to the NBA. The 6-foot Sheppard averaged 13.5 and 16.1 points his last two seasons for the Dolphins before embarking on a peripatetic pro career that took him to 15 teams in several countries from Australia to Cuba to Israel between 2003 and his 2015 retirement. He was a good player who represented his native U.S. Virgin Islands in the Pan-American Games and other international tournaments. Sheppard already had performed for 11 teams over six years when he arrived in Shiraz, Iran in 2008, but this would be a totally different experience.
Sheppard is expected to lift an first-year team to their league playoffs, a rarity in basketball anywhere, while adjusting to a Muslim nation ruled by clerics who run a tight ship, to say the least. Iran was just months away from the so-called Persian Spring when this was filmed, creating (in a sense) a what-is-to-come backdrop that hindsight can afford. If you're a basketball fan, you'll see the frustration Kevin feels playing with teammates with physical talent who haven't developed toughness or basketball sense yet. a.s. Shiraz plays in a gym in front of crowds of 3,000 or so on some night and it's clear that Kevin is their best player. Regarding that part of the story, the younger players improve and start winning enough to challenge for a playoff spot after all. I was entertained and as long as you're not expecting the NBA, you'll enjoy it.
What made this doc stand out for me, however, were the three young women who befriended Kevin early in the season. They were all distinct from each other as people, but they were all intelligent and perceptive people who understood what their societal role was in Iran. While they lived with it to varying degrees, they all wanted better for themselves. These were the kinds of spirits who were at the heart of the Green Movement, which ultimately challenged the mullahs openly in 2009 as a protest of the country's recent presidential election but were eventually quelled.
I started watching this out of curiosity from a basketball sense and even if that was the only contex I got out of it, I'd still think it was worth the time. It was what was happening AWAY from the gym that makes "The Iran Job" a superb documentary interpolating sports with a nation mere months before its biggest political uprising since 1979, when a revolution changed it from a monarchy to a theocracy.
I gave this nine stars because not everyone likes basketball AND international politics (some may consider one topic or the other a distraction) but if you have interest in both, it's definitely worth a ten-star rating.
Short summary: Kevin Sheppard played guard at Jacksonville University, the school that sent Hall of Famer Artis Gilmore to the NBA. The 6-foot Sheppard averaged 13.5 and 16.1 points his last two seasons for the Dolphins before embarking on a peripatetic pro career that took him to 15 teams in several countries from Australia to Cuba to Israel between 2003 and his 2015 retirement. He was a good player who represented his native U.S. Virgin Islands in the Pan-American Games and other international tournaments. Sheppard already had performed for 11 teams over six years when he arrived in Shiraz, Iran in 2008, but this would be a totally different experience.
Sheppard is expected to lift an first-year team to their league playoffs, a rarity in basketball anywhere, while adjusting to a Muslim nation ruled by clerics who run a tight ship, to say the least. Iran was just months away from the so-called Persian Spring when this was filmed, creating (in a sense) a what-is-to-come backdrop that hindsight can afford. If you're a basketball fan, you'll see the frustration Kevin feels playing with teammates with physical talent who haven't developed toughness or basketball sense yet. a.s. Shiraz plays in a gym in front of crowds of 3,000 or so on some night and it's clear that Kevin is their best player. Regarding that part of the story, the younger players improve and start winning enough to challenge for a playoff spot after all. I was entertained and as long as you're not expecting the NBA, you'll enjoy it.
What made this doc stand out for me, however, were the three young women who befriended Kevin early in the season. They were all distinct from each other as people, but they were all intelligent and perceptive people who understood what their societal role was in Iran. While they lived with it to varying degrees, they all wanted better for themselves. These were the kinds of spirits who were at the heart of the Green Movement, which ultimately challenged the mullahs openly in 2009 as a protest of the country's recent presidential election but were eventually quelled.
I started watching this out of curiosity from a basketball sense and even if that was the only contex I got out of it, I'd still think it was worth the time. It was what was happening AWAY from the gym that makes "The Iran Job" a superb documentary interpolating sports with a nation mere months before its biggest political uprising since 1979, when a revolution changed it from a monarchy to a theocracy.
I gave this nine stars because not everyone likes basketball AND international politics (some may consider one topic or the other a distraction) but if you have interest in both, it's definitely worth a ten-star rating.
helpful•00
- brucebaskin
- Dec 22, 2018
Details
- Release date
- Countries of origin
- Official sites
- Languages
- Also known as
- From Texas to Tehran
- Filming locations
- Production companies
- See more company credits at IMDbPro
Box office
- Gross US & Canada
- $23,115
- Opening weekend US & Canada
- $4,295
- Sep 30, 2012
- Gross worldwide
- $23,115
- Runtime1 hour 30 minutes
- Color
Contribute to this page
Suggest an edit or add missing content