Persian Lessons
Historical drama in which the German commander Koch receives language lessons from Gilles, a Belgian Jew who escaped death by claiming to be Persian.
Occupied France, 1942. Gilles is arrested by SS soldiers alongside other Jews and sent to a camp in Germany. He narrowly avoids sudden execution by swearing to the guards that he is not Jewish, but Persian. This lie temporarily saves him, but Gilles gets assigned a life-or-death mission: to teach Persian to Head of Camp Koch, who dreams of opening a restaurant in Iran once the war is over.
Through an ingenious trick, Gilles manages to survive by inventing words of ‘Persian’ every day and teaching them to Koch. The particular relationship between the two men sparks the jealousy of other prisoners and SS guards towards Gilles. And while the suspicions of Koch grow every day, Gilles understands that he will not be able to keep his secret very long.