Banned Iranian filmmaker Jafar Panahi co-directs another unauthorized film that metaphorically recounts his restricted freedom and artistic depression. Whereas his previous This Is Not a Film takes place entirely in Panahi's city apartment, Closed Curtain is filmed from his sprawling beach house. The narrative follows a screenwriter who has escaped a police round-up and is in hiding; he hangs heavy black curtains over the windows to block outside views. Another couple on the run arrives and a ruckus ensues.

Panahi is clearly influenced y Pirandello's Six Characters in Search of an Author, and inserts himself into the action after a certain point where the audience realizes that everything seen before has been fiction.