01:42Like his father, he wants to modernize state and society,
01:46but end his father's confrontational course with the clergy.
01:49His subsequent opponent, Khomeini, now teaches Islamic theory of law.
01:53These martyrs of Islam are Shiite fundamentalists.
01:57They come from the ghettos of Tehran and demand the establishment of a theocratic state on the basis of the Koran.
02:04Any Western influence is to be banned.
02:07Women must wear bales in public again.
02:14The Shah only manages to stay in power through the intervention of the USA.
02:19The American Secret Service CIA supports him with a lot of money
02:23and helps him to establish his own secret service, the SAVAK.
02:30When the ruling couple visits the German opera in Berlin,
02:34the ugly face of the Shah regime is revealed.
02:37Members of his secret service SAVAK attack demonstrators
02:40who are protesting against suppression and torture in Iran.
02:44The situation escalates.
02:49It completely went after the left,
02:52whether it was the left that was dependent on the Soviet Union
02:55or whether it was the social democratic left.
02:58The only people who were allowed to build mosques,
03:02build schools,
03:04teach their own cadres,
03:05were religious folks.
03:08And you bring millions into the cities
03:10in shantytowns,
03:13concentrate them,
03:14make them easy to mobilize,
03:16and allow the clergy to be the only one
03:19who is active there.
03:21And then people are surprised
03:22that the revolution was won by the clergy.
03:24The dealers on the markets play an important social role in Iran.
03:53Department stores,
03:55chain stores,
03:56and supermarkets like the ones you can find in the West
03:58threaten their livelihood.
04:01The Shah doesn't realize the consequences of his policies
04:04and how many enemies he creates for himself with them.
04:07Helping the soldiers with rocks and homemade petrol bombs.
04:28Inevitably, the result is massacre.
04:30Even though their commander-in-chief, the Shah, is gone,
04:41much of the army is still ready to patrol the streets.
04:48Day after day this week,
04:50the demonstrators massed and went forward.
04:52The troops answer their taunts with bullets.
04:54The cinema wrecks fire happened on August 19th, 1978,
05:20when the cinema wrecks in Abadan, Iran,
05:23was set ablaze,
05:25killing between 377 and 470 people.
05:30The event started
05:31when four individuals who were militants
05:34motivated by Islamic extremism
05:36doused the building with airplane fuel
05:39before setting it alight.
05:41The attack was responsible in part
05:43for triggering the Iranian Revolution in 1979,
05:46which saw the overthrow of the ruling dynasty
05:49under the Iranian monarch
05:51and a related outbreak of mass violence.
05:55It was the deadliest terrorist attack in history
05:58until the 1990 massacre of Sri Lankan police officers,
06:03which itself was later surpassed
06:05Say the line, Bert!
06:08by the September 11th attacks in 2001.
06:12Oh my God!
06:28Oh my Lord!
06:30Flames and smoke suddenly swept through the movie hall around 10 p.m.
06:49as an audience of about 700 watched The Deer, an acclaimed Iranian drama film directed by Masood Kimiai.
06:57Those who started the Cinemarex fire in Abaddon were clearly aware of the significance of the date as the anniversary of the 1953 coup, knowing the importance of Abaddon as an oil city to the coup, and that the film The Deer was highly critical of Shah's regime.
07:27Yeah, it was made of the staples.
07:32I loved it.
07:34I loved it.
07:36Just stop having a bar.
07:38You can't think of the landing page of the new army.
07:41You can see it?
07:43Don't be afraid.
07:45Go ahead, go ahead, go ahead!
07:48According to press accounts from the scene, panic-stricken filmgoers stampeded toward
08:16the building's two emergency exits, which reportedly had been locked as an anti-terrorist
08:22measure.
08:24Tehran newspapers said about half the audience managed to get out, an estimated 100 escaping
08:30unhurt and 223 suffering burns or other injuries.
08:35The rest were trampled to death, asphyxiated, or burned alive.
08:40Screams filled the night as hundreds of bystanders gathered helplessly outside, unable to enter
08:46the inferno to rescue victims.
08:49Some determined searchers tried to identify relatives by their rings or other jewelry.
08:55Rescue workers gagged at the grisly scene, and women wailed in the streets.
09:00Firemen battled the blaze for six hours before bringing it under control.
09:05At first, they were unable to get within 50 yards of the theater because of the searing
09:10heat, and when they eventually put out the flames, nothing was left of the building but
09:15twisted and blackened steel girders.
09:19Bulldozers plowed mass graves, normally banned by Islamic custom, and merchants donated yards
09:26of white cloth to make shrouds for the dead.
09:28The governing dynasty initially blamed, quote, Islamic Marxists for the fire, and later reported
09:38that Islamic militants started the fire, while anti-Pahlavi protesters falsely blamed
09:43Sevaq, the Iranian secret police, for setting the fire.
09:47Even though Islamic extremists were responsible for the attack, the Islamic opposition benefited
09:54greatly from the disaster in terms of propaganda because of the general atmosphere of mistrust
10:00and wrath.
10:02Many Iranians accepted the disinformation, which fueled growing anti-Shah fervor.
10:07According to Roy Matahede, an American historian who authored The Mantle of the Prophet, thousands
10:15of Iranians who had felt neutral and had until now thought that the struggle was only between
10:21the Shah and supporters of religiously conservative mullahs felt that the government might put their
10:27own lives on the block to save itself.
10:29Suddenly, for hundreds of thousands, the movement was their own business.
10:34Some diplomats held out the possibility that it could also mark the resurgence of terrorism
10:41by the Mujahideen people-strugglers, the most active of the hardcore urban guerrilla groups
10:47that were responsible for numerous buildings and assassinations in Iran.
10:53Prime Minister Jamshid Amauzgar called the fire a national catastrophe, and the Shah sent his
11:00condolences to families of the victims.
11:03Sinema owners in Tehran and several provincial cities closed their theaters in protest.
11:10The prominent Iranian opposition leaders Ayatollah Sharia Madari, the Shi'ite Muslim spiritual
11:16head, and Mohsen Pazeshpur, a leading nationalist figure in parliament, denied any responsibility
11:23and denounced those who caused it.
11:26Madari blamed hot-headed people with whom we have no links whatsoever.
11:31Since Ramadan, the Muslim month of fasting and prayer, began August 8th, extremist religious
11:38leaders have been addressing mass rallies throughout Iran, urging Iranians to attend prayer sessions
11:44at mosques instead of watching movies or television.
11:47There was speculation that the burning of the theater may have been timed to coincide with the 25th anniversary
11:56of that CIA-backed coup that returned the Shah to power in 1953 after a brief exile.
12:03The government organized pro-Shah rallies in several cities to mark the anniversary.
12:11Moderate opposition political leaders in Tehran repudiated the terrorism, and some suggested
12:17cynically it might be part of a government plot to recoup support among an increasingly critical public.
12:24It was really an abominable act, said long-time dissident Kareem Sanjabi, 73.
12:31The whole country is grief-stricken.
12:34The Shah was unable to lock up all of his opponents, and on the streets of Iran, the protests
12:39grew ever more vociferous.
12:43No longer were the crowds yelling, the Shah must go.
12:46Now, the screams of death to the Shah had become a common refrain in the streets of Tehran.
12:54And when we talk about destruction, don't you know that you can count me out?
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