Iranian Cinema in the 28th Fajr Film Festival

This year the Fajr Film Festival will be held from 25 January to 4 February as the Iranian society has been witness to some political debates and social unrest. This is the first major cultural event following June 2009 presidential election, although government managers have been planning it since a long time ago. For the fist time this year, film critics and reporters are going to watch the films at a public venue along with film directors and foreign visitors.

Actors’ Salaries

In early fall, a report was broadcast in a popular new program of the Iranian television about “chaotic situation of actor’s salaries.” The figure announced in that program about salaries paid to actors elicited different reactions. Some of those actors denied having been paid those salaries and other remained silent. A major question was posed about the source of that information. In Iran, the content of contracts signed between producers and actors are not usually made public and nobody is aware of the exact salaries of actors. It is possible to guess who earns more, but no accurate figure had been given up to that time.

26th Short Film Festival

Tehran Short Film Festival is one of the most purposeful festivals held in Iran. it is a venue for screening a selection of short films produced in the course of the year. Since short films cannot be screened at movie theaters, the festival is the best opportunity for watching films made by young directors. During the current year, Nasser Gholamrezaei (director), Ensiyeh Shah-Hosseini (director), Mohammad Dormanesh (director), Saeed Mostaghasi (film critic), and Kaveh Bahrami-Moqaddam (short film director) selected films and a jury consisting of Mehrdad Oskui (documentarian), Mohammad Reza Aslani (director), Mohammad Reza Arab (director), Abdollah Alimorad (animator), Mohammad Gabrlou (film critic), Ahmad Reza Garshasebi (director) and Mahnaz Mazaheri (arts expert) judged the films.

5th Parvin Film Festival

Parvin Film Festival which is named after the famous Iranian moralistic poet, Parvin E’tesami, is also special to women (like Kowsar Film Festival). Here, female directors can screen their works and their male counterparts can also bring their works on women. Its main difference with Kowsar Film Festival was its international scope which included films from Sweden, Germany and UK. A subsidiary section was special to a poll conducted on 130 cultural and artistic figures of Iran who were asked to choose the best film on women in history of the Iranian cinema.

Iranian Cinema Celebration

The Iranian Cinema Celebration is held annually on the national Cinema Day. First, a jury reviews films long before the celebration and the selected ones are introduced during the Iranian Cinema Celebration. It has gradually become a rival event for Fajr International Film Festival, so that, prizes dispensed at both events are of the same importance to filmmakers. The celebration is also a gathering of cinema guilds with government playing the least part in its organization. During the current year, however, developments related to the 10th presidential election disrupted the annual event. Farhad Tohidi, the renowned Iranian screenwriter who was secretary of this year’s Iranian Cinema Celebration, had announced two months earlier (in late summer) that since films have been delivered belatedly and jury members are not willing to go through them, the celebration could not be held on schedule. While everybody believed that there would be no celebration during the current year, an official statement released by the House of Cinema announced that it would be held in a different way.