The annual Boston Festival of Films From Iran (Friday through Jan. 29 at the Museum of Fine Arts) provides area audiences with one of the most extensive exhibitions of contemporary Iranian cinema in the United States. Though politics and logistical complexities have contributed to making this edition of the 19-year-old festival smaller than in years past, the films are no less compelling.

Most notable are new films from internationally acclaimed directors Jafar Panahi and Mohammad Rasoulof, both of whom are under house arrest for being subversive voices against Iran’s political regime. Their works are currently banned in Iran.

“Because of everything that’s happening in Iran right now, this year’s Festival of Films From Iran was somewhat more difficult to put together than in years past,’’ says Carter Long, the MFA’s Katharine Stone White Curator of Film and Video. “The result is a leaner but incredibly powerful selection of films by some of Iran’s most important contemporary filmmakers - Abbas Kiarostami, Mohammad Rasoulof, Jafar Panahi, and others. We open with Abbas Kiarostami’s Koker Trilogy (‘And Life Goes On,’ ‘Through the Olive Trees,’ and ‘Where Is the Friend’s Home?’), which are among Kiarostami’s greatest films. Two of this year’s highlights for me are Morteza Farshbaf’s ‘Mourning’ and Jafar Panahi’s ‘This Is Not a Film.’ Shot by Panahi himself with a hand-held camera, it is a powerful testament to the compulsion of a great artist to create, and a wonderful examination of his passion for film.’’

“This Is Not a Film’’ (Jan. 21 at 7:30 p.m.) chronicles a routine day in Panahi’s life while he’s confined to his luxurious Tehran apartment awaiting the verdict in an appeal of his sentence: six years jail time and a 20-year ban on filmmaking.

“Good Bye’’ (Jan. 27, 7:45 p.m. and Jan. 29, 12:30 p.m.) is Rasoulof’s powerful statement against the repressive ruling system that produced his own struggles with censorship in Iran. The film tells the story of Noura (Leyla Zareh), who is trying to leave Iran after losing her license to practice law and whose journalist husband has been forced to go underground. Rasoulof’s 2009 film “The White Meadows,’’ which closed the MFA festival last year, used symbolism to convey repression. “Good Bye’’ is more overt in its depiction of the consequences faced by Iranian dissidents. Reportedly, Rasoulof’s friends managed to sneak a copy of “Good Bye’’ out of Iran so it could screen in the Un Certain Regard section at the Cannes International Film Festival in 2011.