This genre flourished both before and after the Islamic Revolution in Iran. As evidenced in Fīlmfārsī before the Revolution, and, later, in the postrevolutionary cinema of the Iran-Iraq War, known as the “War of Sacred Defense,” it was mainly men who displayed courage and chivalric values in films. Of course, after the Islamic Revolution, the role of women gradually became more prominent in Iranian films despite Islamic restrictions, to the extent that it eventually challenged masculinity and manhood in Iranian cinema.