PRESS REVIEW

PRESS REVIEW
MOVIE REVIEW
Jafar Panahi's "This Is Not a Film" is the film of Cannes: simple, radical, surprising, moving.
Dennis Lim, from the New York Times
VARIETY
20/05/2011
This Is Not a Film (In film nist)
(Documentary - Iran)
Directed by Jafar Panahi, Mojtaba Mirtahmasb.
With: Jafar Panahi.
(International sales: Wide Management, Paris.)
Take away his pen, and a writer will still find a way to write, but ban an Iranian filmmaker from
making films, and what does he do? In the case of irrepressible auteur Jafar Panahi, it'll take more
than an arrest and 20-year filmmaking ban to silence the Iranian New Wave master. Released from
prison but ordered not to direct, write screenplays, give interviews or leave the country, Panahi
tests his luck with "This Is Not a Film," showing himself unbroken by censorship. If pic could be
smuggled out to Cannes, then it could find sympathetic auds elsewhere as well.
Jafar Panahi tries a different tact in “This Is Not a Film”
after the director was forbidden from making films.
Pic assumes a familiarity with Panahi's recent persecution, which sparked an international outcry
after the award-winning director of such soft-spoken, humanist tales as "The Circle" and "Offside"
was arrested on March 1, 2010, for "propaganda against the Islamic Republic" in support of those
protesting the re-election of Iranian president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. One year later, on March 15,
2011, Panahi dared to turn the camera on himself, enlisting helmer Mojtaba Mirtahmasb (who
specializes in "behind-the-scenes of Iranian filmmakers not making films") for what at first appears to
be a mundane day-in-the-life exercise.
Panahi sits at his kitchen table eating breakfast when he calls Mirtahmasb. Rather than discuss by
phone, he instructs his colleague to drop by to discuss a few ideas. "Just don't tell anyone you're
coming over," he says, clearly aware of the danger in what they're about to do. Next we see Panahi's
bedroom, empty as his phone messages play aloud. Because he has been forbidden from directing,
others must do it for him; hence, one message features his son explaining that he set up the camera
on a chair.
Such precautions are strictly semantic, of course. Panahi can call this assembly whatever he pleases
(the end credits refer to it as "an effort by" him and Mirtahmasb, with all other credits/thanks left
blank), but Iranian authorities aren't likely to share his sense of humor. Besides, Iranian directors are
notorious for spinning elegant parables from minimalist situations, such as buying a goldfish
(Panahi's debut, "The White Balloon") or losing a pair of shoes ("Children of Heaven"), and this
project feels none the slimmer for its humble constraints. If anything, it marks a courageous act of
non-violent protest.
If Panahi can't give interviews, then he will tell his own story, beginning with a reading of the
screenplay he wasn't allowed to film. Laying tape across his living room floor to delineate the
apartment where the story takes place, Panahi summarizes the first few shots in the story, about a
young woman whose parents forbid her to attend university, locking her in a room where she spies a
handsome stranger through her window.
Like Lars von Trier's conceptual "Dogville," "This Is Not a Film" promises to test our idea of what form
a film can take. Required to play all the roles, Panahi is overcome by emotion and interrupts himself,
asking, "If we could tell a film, then why make a film?" The way he sees it, description cannot possibly
do justice to the power of cinema, making his punishment seem all the more harsh. Panahi
frequently worries that the footage is turning out to be a lie. "It is not me," he frets, and we wonder
just how much he's holding back.
As "This Is Not a Film" unspools, Panahi's involvement comes to feel more and more like direction in
the traditional sense. At first, he is careful to remain the only character on camera, ostensibly a
precaution in case others might be punished for colluding with him on the project. Then his pet
Iguana, Igi, makes a cameo, followed by a yappy dog belonging to Panahi's downstairs neighbor,
Shima (she remains out of frame). A delivery man hands a bag of food through the door, unaware
that he's guest-starring in Panahi's non-film. Finally, a friendly college student drops by to collect his
trash, temporarily subbing in for the building custodian. Panahi can't help making an actor out of
him, with the lad reminiscing about the day the authorities came to arrest Panahi as the two share an
elevator ride together.
This would be the film's big setpiece, conducted as explosions go off all around them. The noises,
alarming when we first hear them, turn out to be nothing more than firecrackers. Panahi's day of
filming falls on Fireworks Wednesday, which marks the Persian New Year -- a holiday that makes
innocuous law-breakers of many, at least according to a news report Panahi watches, in which the
president decrees fireworks illegal. Standing at his balcony, filming the revelry with his iPhone, he
seems to be saying that directing is more defiant an act than lighting a firecracker or two. Truth be
told, Panahi's poignant "Film" is infinitely more explosive.
Peter Debruge
Camera (color, DV), Panahi, Mirtahmasb. Reviewed at Cannes Film Festival (Special Screenings), May
19, 2011. Running time: 78 MIN.
INDIEWIRE
19/05/2011
Jafar Panahi Turns Censorship Into Art with Stunning “This is Not a Film”
Jafar Panahi in "This is Not a Film."
Jafar Panahi has taken risky circumstances and turned them into art. “This is Not a Film” delivers a
sharp, measured critique of the conditions that now find him on his way to jail. A first-person account
of the Iranian filmmaker at home awaiting news of his upcoming prison sentencing, it puts a human
face on Iranian censorship. Aided by his friend, documentarian Mojtaba Mirtahmasb, Panahi muses
on the state of affairs that led to his six-year prison sentencing and 20-year ban on making movies.
Miraculously smuggled into Cannes just before the festival began, “This is Not a Film” is a moving
expression of frustration, as well as an eloquent indictment of Iranian society.
Unlike fellow Iranian auteur Abbas Kiarostami, Panahi generally uses genre to tell widely accessible
stories. Despite its microbudget format, “This is Not a Film” falls in step with that tendency. His selfportrait has plenty of details, but never feels slow. Panahi gradually introduces viewers to his routine
with a stationary camera that watches him to prepare breakfast while he speaks on the phone with
his lawyer. As the day continues, his actions range from the energetic to the mundane. He feeds his
friendly iguana, discusses his legal woes, reminisces for the camera about his past projects and
mentions others that went unrealized. Overall, he’s a likable presence, which deepens the discomfort
surrounding his looming fate.
From the first scene, Panahi acknowledges that he will almost certainly go to prison and that none of
his peers can help out. “If they make the slightest move, they’ll be banned as well,” he sighs. The only
man capable of doing something about Panahi’s conditions is the man himself.
Proving the personal connection he has to his work, Panahi uses his existing films to analyze his
situation. He plays a scene from his second feature, “Mirror,” in which a young girl decided she didn’t
want to act anymore and removed the cast her character was supposed to wear. “I think I’m in the
same position,” Panahi says. “I must remove the cast and throw it away.” By that he means he wants
to tell the truth, complaining that he came across in earlier scenes as more character than the real
thing. Panahi wants to get real and quickly does.
Arranging his living room as though it were a movie set, Panahi reads aloud the screenplay for a
project rejected by governments officials, in which a young girl is banned from attending university
by her traditionalist parents. After explaining the opening scene for several minutes, Panahi
eventually grows exasperated. “If we can tell a film,” he says, “why can’t we make a film?”
Mirtahmasb continues to record Panahi, and the latter director can’t help but take control. “Go on,
cut,” he says to his colleague. “You can’t direct,” Mirtahmasb tells him. “It’s an offense.” Panahi
smiles, revealing the clever ruse of the movie’s title. “I hope this works,” he says.
Throughout “This is Not a Film,” Panahi comes across as a restless creative mind enlivened by dire
circumstances. (He briefly mentions another screenplay he wrote that was also shot down by
officials, “Return,” which criticized the Iraq war.) The production goes beyond the limitations of an
extended monologue. At one point, Mirtahmasb’s camera captures Panahi’s iguana wandering up a
wall, a prolonged bit that contrasts with a phone call Panahi makes to his lawyer on the soundtrack.
It’s a thoughtful moment, conveying the continuity of life in its simplest terms regardless of what sort
of unpleasantness may come.
The movie is also a record of its making: “Listen, Jafar,” Mirtahmasb says. “What matters is that this
is documented. It matters that these cameras stay on.” So they do: As the day winds down, Panahi
settles onto his couch and watches TV. He flips through reports on the March tsunami in Japan and
settles on a newscast about the president’s declaration that fireworks are illegal. To underscore the
irony, Panahi grabs his iPhone and films the fireworks outside his window.
The movie continues to expand its reach. A young college student living in the building drops by to
take out Panahi’s trash and the director follows him into the elevator to ask him about his career
plans. (“All of a sudden, I’ve jumped into your film,” the guy says.) It’s hardly a meandering climax:
Panahi displays Iran’s potential future, implying the persistence of individualism under oppressive
circumstances. This explains Panahi’s inner resolve as well. He ends on an eerie note: “Please don’t
come outside,” the college kid says to Panahi. “They’ll see your camera.” But the director doesn’t
listen, and this project’s existence shows he continues to ignore the safest bet.
Still, there’s a constant sense that the two creators have worked out a loophole to make this happen.
According to Mirtahmasb, speaking from behind the camera, the seed for movie came from an
interest in making a behind-the-scenes document of “Iranians not making films.” Credits identify it as
“an effort by” Panahi and Mirtahmasb, rather than calling them directors. Other credits are left
blank, and the final end credit includes a dedication to Iranian filmmakers. It’s an appropriate venue
for that message; no matter the constrictions on its existence, “This is Not a Film” is, in fact, a great
one.
HOW WILL IT PLAY? How can it play? Panahi is still awaiting his sentencing, and rumors floating
around Cannes suggest that the only copy of the movie exists on a flash drive. But if somebody
managed to smuggle it to Cannes, it will almost certainly receive a warm (if not commercial)
welcome around the world. It’s just a question of the steps required to get it there.
Eric Kohn
MOVIE LINE
20/05/2011
Banned Filmmaker Jafar Panahi Sends a Message in a Bottle with This Is Not a Film
The annals of filmmaking are filled with stories of people who managed to make films against all
odds, without money, without shooting permits, without proper professional equipment. This Is Not
a Film, or In Film Nist, the 75-minute film directed by Iranian filmmaker Jafar Panahi and Mojtaba
Mirtahmasb that has screened here out of competition, may be the ultimate achievement in stealth
filmmaking, considering that Panahi is currently serving a six-year jail sentence and has been banned
by the Iranian government from making films for 20 years. And yet somehow he has made a movie
that has found its way to one of the world’s major film festivals: This Is Not a Film is a small but
extremely significant message in a bottle.
The movie covers a day in Panahi’s life as he’s waiting to hear the results of his appeal. It was shot
with a digital camera (manned by Mirtahmasb, a documentary filmmaker, who is also heard asking
Panahi questions off-camera) and an i-Phone (wielded, slyly, by Panahi, because how much harm can
a little home movie do?). Mirtahmasb’s camera captures the mundane details of Panahi’s life as he
makes and takes calls on his cellphone (including one from his lawyer), answers the door for the
food-delivery guy, feeds some greens to his daughter’s large, and surprisingly personable, pet iguana.
“If we could tell a film, then why make a film?”
From these mundane details spring all sorts of provocative, frustrated conversations about the
nature of filmmaking under a repressive regime. At one point, Panahi reveals that he’s going to tell
the story of a script that he wrote before his arrest, which the authorities had refused to approve.
With masking tape, he marks off a corner of his nicely furnished living room to serve as a makeshift
set; he describes the actions of his main character, a suicidal young woman. Then he stops abruptly,
realizing the futility of the enterprise: “If we could tell a film, then why make a film?”
In the course of the day, we hear fireworks outside that sound like gunshots, part of an event known
as “Fireworks Wednesday” that’s supposedly benign and celebratory but which, under current
conditions, has the capacity to turn violent. A neighbor rings the doorbell of Panahi’s apartment: She
wonders if he’ll watch her small, noisy dog for a few hours while she goes off to the fireworks, and
though Panahi at first agrees, he calls her back just seconds later when the dog launches into a
barking tirade. Panahi goes online, noting that his access to sites he might like to visit has been
seriously curtailed. He turns on the television to catch news of the earthquake in Japan.
In the film’s final section, filmed by Panahi himself (now manning the professional camera and not
the i-Phone), an impromptu encounter with a young man who’s filling in for the building’s
superintendent becomes a kind of mini-Panahi film. Pictures like The Circle and Offside are deeply
political movies that derive all their meaning from depictions of people’s everyday lives, rather than
from any contrived arrangement of abstract ideas. By the end of This Is Not a Film Panahi, going from
floor to floor with this affable, photogenic guy (he’s also a student) as he collects the residents’
garbage, has turned the camera away from himself and out toward the world, even if that world is
only an elevator and, later, a courtyard beyond which lies a blazing bonfire that may or may not be
celebratory. This Is Not a Film is so technically modest that it almost isn’t a film. Yet in its simplicity
it’s as direct as a laser beam, underscoring why Panahi is considered so dangerous by his country’s
government: The difference between just looking and really seeing is second nature to him.
Stephanie Zacharek
THE GUARDIAN
21/05/2011
Jafar Panahi not in Cannes for This Is Not a Film premiere
Banned Iranian director who received prison sentence for criticising regime stars in movie smuggled
out of Iran
Iranian filmmaker Jafar Panahi.
Most prints for films premiering at Cannes are delivered to the Croisette by private helicopter, or
clutched in the sweaty paws of their devoted directors. Jafar Panahi's new film, This Is Not a Film,
was smuggled into the country on a USB stick buried inside a cake posted from Iran to Paris.
Panahi, the virtuoso neo-realist who won a prize at Cannes for his debut, The White Balloon, in 1995,
and, at 50, now has one of the most sagging mantlepieces in cinema, is currently stuck in Iran,
awaiting the verdict of his appeal against a six-year prison term, and 20-year-ban on film-making,
talking to the press and travelling abroad. The sentence was passed in December 2010, after the
Iranian government accused him of "colluding with the intention to commit crimes against the
country's national security and propaganda against the Islamic Republic". Panahi denies the charges.
So This Is Not A Film was presented by its nominal director, Mojtaba Mirtahasebi, who spends a day
with Panahi in his high-rise apartment, sipping tea, chewing sugarlumps and watching the director
map out scenes from a screenplay he's been working on. It sounds earnest: in fact it's fantastically
entertaining, full of incidents that would be too far-fetched for the wildest farce: endless animals get
dumped on the director to babysit, for instance, including a 6ft iguana which paces the apartment
restlessly, as unhappy to be cooped up as his temporary master.
For most of the film, Panahi endeavours to exploit a loophole in his sentence by being in front of the
camera, rather than behind. But he becomes disillusioned with the project – "Why would you make a
film if you could just talk through it?" – and he's a compulsive director, filming his companion and
any visitors on his iPhone; documenting the scenes outside the window. The pair even manage to
have some fun with the censorship – the end credits give special thanks to a blank screen; that title
feels more tongue-in-cheek than drum-beating.
"We have a saying in Iran," said Mirtahasebi, "that when hairdressers get bored they cut each others'
hair. That is what we were doing: filming one another." The image is as amusing as it is poignant: for
both, simply the documentation of events is enough to make such a project valuable.
It's also a tool in lobbying round the world for Panahi's liberty. "I think making a film is like giving
birth to a child – it's a very complicated thing," said Mirtahasebi. "But I think at the same time to
spread it around is more difficult – it's like actually raising a child. And that is the function of festivals
like Cannes."
It is also the function of emerging technologies: Panahi speaks passionately about the role of the
digital world in creating lasting archives, even if they cannot be shared at the time. Mirtahasebi, too,
suggests that a familiarity with the online world gave them a natural advantage over the Iranian
establishment, which he suspected of ignorance about both cinema itself and the internet: "They
don't realise that they can't adapt it to fit their own vision." Indeed, Panahi watched the Cannes
press conference unfold through a Skype and an iPad camera – although all interaction was, by
necessity, one way.
His colleague, meanwhile, was visibly nervous to be presenting the film in public, eager to emphasise
how closely he needed to monitor his words to protect his own safety once he returns to Iran (even
the type of cake was information not deemed shareable). Solidarity with his colleague, he confirmed,
was a fraught business.
"We have decided to take the risks of what we're doing. Step by step, we are trying to fight. This has
a price. But we wanted to use that energy that is not being used in film-making. We didn't want to
give up."
Panahi's arrest in December was not his first. During last year's Cannes festival, Panahi was on
hunger strike in prison in Tehran to protest against being imprisoned on unspecified charges. The
actor Juliette Binoche paid tribute to him in an emotional press conference, and, accepting the best
actress award for Certified Copy (directed by the Iranian film-maker Abbas Kiarostami), held up a
placard bearing Panahi's name. These actions were widely believed to have aided his release less
than a week later.
But his freedom proved shortlived. One might have forgiven Mirtahasebi and Panahi for feeling
sceptical about the potential leverage of cinema. Martin Scorsese, Ken Loach, and thousands of
others have signed petitions and campaigned for his release. Yet to no apparent avail. Surely there
must be some disillusion? "Not at all," said Mirtahasebi. "Hope is what is guarding us. It's how we are
able to work and to carry on. Hope is the last thing we've got."
Catherine Shoard
AFP
20/05/2011
Iranian dissident's 'This Is Not A Film' premieres at Cannes
CANNES, France — Iranian film-maker Jafar Panahi's "This Is Not A Film" premiered at Cannes on
Thursday after being smuggled out of the Islamic republic where the dissident has been sentenced to
six years in jail.
The film, "In Film Nist" in Farsi and screening out of competition, depicts a day in Panahi's life as he
waits to hear the appeal's verdict on his jail sentence, as well as a 20-year film-making ban and a
travel ban.
An Iranian court in December handed Panahi, 50, the sentence after he was convicted of
"propaganda against the system" for making a film about unrest after the disputed re-election of
President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad in June 2009.
Fellow Iranian Mohammad Rasoulof, whose "Be Omid e Didar" ("Goodbye") is in the festival's Un
Certain Regard section, received the same sentence and was also not able to attend Cannes despite
the reported lifting of his travel ban.
"This Is Not A Film" begins with what sounds like distant sporadic gunfire ringing out, followed by
sirens. But, just as this is not a film, it transpires that the gunfire is in fact fireworks during a
traditional fire festival.
But again, things are not what they seem. The festival is often seized on as an opportunity to protest
-- implicitly or explicitly -- against the government, and some kind of protest going on is hinted at
during the film.
This year, the festival fell on the night of March 15, the day during which Panahi's film was shot.
Panahi wanders around his surprisingly plush apartment, talking to his lawyer on the phone and
trying to build a relationship with a large pet lizard.
A woman neighbour comes to try and get him to look after her dog, and a man studying for a
master's degree in the arts becomes an accidental protagonist when he arrives to collect the rubbish.
Mirtahmasb shoots Panahi with a professional video camera, while Panahi shoots with an iPhone,
raising the question: is what he's doing making a film?
"You call this a film?" Panahi asks Mirtahmasb at one point.
Panahi reads from and enacts a film script about a girl who is locked up to prevent her going to
university. The script was was refused by Iranian authorities, again raising the question: when does a
film become a film?
Panahi watches extracts from his own films, comparing himself to some of his characters, including a
little girl acting in his 1997 film "The Mirror" who refuses to act and throws off the cast on her arm.
"I must remove my cast and throw it away," Panahi says.
The film's credits roll with "Thanks to colleagues:" and "Many thanks to:" followed by blank spaces
and then an announcement that the film is "Dedicated to Iranian film-makers."
Panahi has been feted in his absence at foreign film festivals and Cannes is no exception.
The film's co-director, Mojtaba Mirtahmasb, addressed the audience before the screening.
"I'm very happy that the film could be made and very happy that it's at Cannes," he said. "The god
Zaroastra said that to fight darkness you don't brandish a sword but you light a candle."
Berlin in February, Venice in September and Cannes a year ago all invited him to sit on their juries,
leaving a symbolic empty chair for him when he was barred from leaving Iran.
Panahi is known for his gritty, socially critical movies such as "The Circle," which bagged the 2000
Venice Golden Lion award, "Crimson Gold," and "Offside," winner of a Silver Bear at the 2006 Berlin
film festival.
Charles Onians
AROUND THE FILMMAKERS
THE NEW YORK TIMES
11/01/2011
Jafar Panahi
Jaffar Panahi, an internationally renowned Iranian filmmaker, was convicted on charges of working
against the ruling system in Iran and sentenced to six years in prison in January 2011. Mr. Panahi was
arrested on March 2010 for "plans" to make a film about the protests that followed the disputed
2009 presidential election.
He was sentenced to jail along with another prominent filmmaker. Mr. Panahi was also banned from
shooting movies or writing scripts for 20 years, his lawyer said. The other filmmaker is Mohammad
Rasulov. Both said they would appeal their sentences.
The charges against Mr. Panahi were never made clear, but the news agency reported that his case
went before the Revolutionary Court, which suggested that the charges were security related.
Mr. Panahi had supported the opposition movement and appeared in international film festivals
outside the country wearing a green scarf, in the trademark color of the opposition. His films, which
are not considered political, have won awards at the Chicago, Cannes and Berlin film festivals.
His arrest in March 2010 appeared to fit a pattern of the intimidation of prominent artists who
support the antigovernment movement. Mr. Panahi was briefly detained in the summer of 2009
during the funeral of a 19-year-old protester who was believed to have been killed by government
forces. His passport was confiscated and he was barred from leaving the country.
Some of Mr. Panahi's films have been banned in Iran. His 2000 film ''The Circle,'' illustrated the
situation of women in Islam through an interlocking series of incidents that begins with a group of
prostitutes freshly released from prison and ends with a woman back in jail. ''Crimson Gold,'' about
the life of one marginal citizen of the Iranian capital, has been banned there, even for private
screenings, because of its sharply critical look at Iranian society under the mullahs. His 1995 film
''White Balloon,'' a keenly observed picture of Iranian life through the eyes of a clever little girl, won
a Camera d'Or at the Cannes Film Festival.
Behrouz Mehri
THE NEW YORK TIMES
THE LEDE – Blogging the news with Robert MacKey
30/04/2011
American Filmmakers Call for Release of Iranian Director
As Reuters reports, on Friday a group of leading American filmmakers — including Steven Spielberg,
Martin Scorsese and Francis Ford Coppola — called on Iran’s government to release Jafar Panahi, an
Iranian director who has supported the country’s opposition movement, and was detained in Tehran
at the beginning of March.
Last month, Iran’s most celebrated filmmaker, Abbas Kiarostami, sent The Lede an open letter calling
for Mr. Panahi’s release. After his arrest, a newspaper that supports the government claimed that
Mr. Panahi, who has directed films like “Crimson Gold” and “The White Balloon,” was engaged in
making an anti-regime film.
In the words of Keith Phipps — who writes (serious) reviews of films for The A/V Club, the arts
section of The Onion — “seemingly every major American director,” signed a petition calling for Mr.
Panahi’s release.
The list of signatures includes: Paul Thomas Anderson, Joel and Ethan Coen, Francis Ford Coppola,
Jonathan Demme, Robert De Niro, Curtis Hanson, Jim Jarmusch, Ang Lee, Richard Linklater, Terrence
Malick, Michael Moore, Robert Redford, Martin Scorsese, James Schamus, Paul Schrader, Steven
Soderbergh, Steven Spielberg, Oliver Stone and Frederick Wiseman.
Mr. Phipps also posted the full text of the letter signed by the filmmakers, which reads:
Jafar Panahi, the internationally acclaimed Iranian director of such award-winning films as The White
Balloon, The Circle, Crimson Gold and Offside, was arrested at his home on March 1st in a raid by
plain-clothed security forces. He has been held since then in Tehran’s notorious Evin prison.
A recent letter from Mr. Panahi’s wife expressed her deep concerns about her husband’s heart
condition, and about his having been moved to a smaller cell. Mr. Panahi’s films have been banned
from screening in Iran for the past ten years and he has effectively been kept from working for the
past four years. Last October, his passport was confiscated and he was banned from leaving the
country. Upon his arrest, Islamic Republic officials initially charged Mr. Panahi with “unspecified
crimes.” They have since reversed themselves, and the charges are nowspecifically related to his
work as a filmmaker.
We (the undersigned) stand in solidarity with a fellow filmmaker, condemn this detention, and
strongly urge the Iranian government to release Mr. Panahi immediately.
Iran’s contributions to international cinema have been rightfully heralded, and encouraged those of
us outside the country to respect and cherish its people and their stories. Like artists everywhere,
Iran’s filmmakers should be celebrated, not censored, repressed, and imprisoned.
Robert MacKey
THE NEW YORK TIMES
THE LEDE – Blogging the news with Robert MacKey
23/05/2011
Iran Jails Leading Filmmaker for 6 Years
Jafar Panahi, a celebrated Iranian filmmaker who was arrested in February and accused of working
on an “anti-regime” film, was sentenced to six years in prison on Saturday in Tehran, his lawyer told
an Iranian news agency on Monday.
Mr. Panahi, who had expressed support for Iran’s opposition green movement during post-election
protests in 2009, “has also been banned from making films, writing any kind of scripts, traveling
abroad and talking to local and foreign media for 20 years,” according to his lawyer, Farideh Gheyrat.
The 50-year-old filmmaker was first detained in July 2009, six weeks after Iran’s disputed presidential
election, when he attended a mourning ceremony in Tehran for protesters who were killed during
the demonstrations. The following month, Mr. Panahi was allowed to travel to the Montreal Film
Festival, where he was the president of the jury, and he made a point of wearing a green scarf to the
opening ceremony.
His conviction comes despite a high-profile campaign by fellow filmmakers inside Iran and abroad to
win his release. In March, Abbas Kiarostami, Iran’s most famous director, wrote an open letter to
Iran’s authorities calling for the immediate release of both Mr. Panahi and another detained
filmmaker, Mahmoud Rasoulof, who was also sentenced to six years in prison for his work on the
same unfinished film. In April, a group of leading American filmmakers — including Steven Spielberg,
Martin Scorsese and Francis Ford Coppola — signed another open letter on Mr. Panahi’s behalf. In
May, days after Juliette Binoche was filmed crying as Mr. Panahi’s detention was discussed at the
Cannes Film Festival, Mr. Panahi was granted a temporary release on bail.
Among Mr. Panahi’s prize-winning films are “The White Balloon,” “ The Circle,” “ Offside,” and “
Crimson Gold.”
In an interview with Agence France-Presse in August, Mr. Panahi explained that the film he was
shooting with Mr. Rasoulof concerned a “family and the postelection developments.” He added:
“When a filmmaker does not make films it is as if he is jailed. Even when he is freed from the small
jail, he finds himself wandering in a larger jail. The main question is: why should it be a crime to make
a movie? A finished film, well, it can get banned but not the director.”
Last month, Mr. Panahi delivered an impassioned defense of his work as a filmmaker to the court in
Tehran. Near the end of his statement, he explained that he loved his country and had no desire to
make films anywhere else:
All said, despite all the injustice done to me, I, Jafar Panahi, declare once again that I am an Iranian, I
am staying in my country and I like to work in my own country. I love my country, I have paid a price
for this love too, and I am willing to pay again if necessary. I have yet another declaration to add to
the first one. As shown in my films, I declare that I believe in the right of “the other” to be different, I
believe in mutual understanding and respect, as well as in tolerance; the tolerance that forbid me
from judgment and hatred. I don’t hate anybody, not even my interrogators.
Despite the international acclaim Iranian filmmakers have brought to their nation in the past two
decades, the country’s government has banned many films that have won prizes abroad and shown a
surprising fear of fiction films that deal with life in Iran. In 2000, one of Iran’s most popular
filmmakers, Mohsen Makhmalbaf, explained that his plans to establish a film school in Tehran in
1996 had been rejected by the government at about the same time he had produced a drama based
on his own part in the country’s Islamic revolution, “A Moment of Innocence.” Mr. Makhmalbaf
wrote:
I informed the Iranian ministry of culture of my plans to accept 100 students of cinema through a
selection exam, and to use new methods to train them for 4 years. But the ministry of culture of the
time did not accept. They feared the generation of a new wave of young filmmakers making films in
favor of democracy, thus officially announced that one dangerous filmmaker like me was enough for
one country and that one hundred others like me were not needed.
Robert MacKey
THE NEW YORK TIMES
21/05/2011
Cannes Q. and A.: The Loneliness of the Banned Filmmaker
CANNES, France— Film festivals around the world have reacted to the arrest, banning and
conviction of the Iranian filmmaker Jafar Panahi with official statements, special screenings and
gestures of solidarity — at the Berlin Film Festival earlier this year, a seat was left empty for Mr.
Panahi at every screening in the main venue. But the most meaningful act of all may be the Cannes
Film Festival’s decision — announced just days before screenings got under way — to show new films
that Mr. Panahi and his countryman Mohammed Rasoulof had made in defiance of their bans. (Like
Mr. Panahi, Mr. Rasoulof, whose new film, “Goodbye,” is about an Iranian woman trying to leave the
country, has been convicted for collusion against the regime — both were given six-year prison
sentences, which are being appealed.)
Billed as “an effort” by Mr. Panahi and Mojtaba Mirtahmasb and dedicated to all Iranian
filmmakers, “This Is Not a Film” may be the ultimate underground movie: made for 3200 euros, shot
on digital video (and, at one point, an iPhone) and smuggled to France on a USB thumb drive that
was hidden inside a cake.
The project began when Mr. Panahi got in touch with Mr. Mirtahmasb, a documentary filmmaker,
who was planning a film on “filmmakers who can’t make films,” Mr. Mirtahmasb said in an interview
at the Carlton Hotel here on Friday. Seemingly simple but radical in more ways than one, “This Is Not
a Film” turns a political issue and a human tragedy into a formal challenge. Shot almost entirely in
Mr. Panahi’s apartment, this documentary of sorts purports to chronicle a day in his life (although, as
in much of the best Iranian cinema, the lines between fiction and reality are hardly clear-cut).
As fireworks go off in the streets outside — the film was shot in March, during the Persian New Year
celebrations — Mr. Panahi fields phone calls, watches television news, discusses scenes from his
movies, describes a script that may now never be realized and withstands all manner of friendly
interruptions, from his daughter’s large pet iguana, a neighbor looking for a dog sitter and the
building’s garbage collector. Below are excerpts from the conversation with Mr. Mirtahmasb, who
spoke in Farsi through a translator.
Q.
Have you been in touch with Mr. Panahi since you’ve been here in Cannes?
A.
I’m in contact with him, and his wife and his daughter are here and they are in contact with him all
the time — he’s always on Skype. Jafar is very happy that his film is here but I’m sad he is not here
and I miss him a lot.
Manohla Dargis, a chief film critic of The New York Times, and Melena Ryzik and Dennis Lim are
reporting from the Cannes Film Festival.
Q.
Has there been any reaction from the Iranian authorities about the film’s screening here?
A.
Before Cannes accepted this film and Mr. Rasoulof’s, the authorities had announced that there
wouldn’t be any Iranian films in the festival. After Cannes announced, I think they were shocked in a
way. A few days later they said that these films are not representing the official position. I was a little
bit worried before leaving but I have heard nothing. Let’s wait and see what will happen when I go
back.
Q.
The film appears to take place over the course of a day — did you actually shoot it in a single day?
A.
We shot for four days over a 10-day period, editing at the same time. We started five days before the
Iranian New Year celebrations, on the 21st of March, the first day of spring, and we ended five days
after.
Q.
Is it accurate to call the film a blend of fiction and documentary? Were the various interruptions —
from the neighbor and the garbage collector, for instance — spontaneous or staged?
A.
I refer to Godard, who said if you want to make a documentary you should automatically go to the
fiction, and if you want to nourish your fiction you have to come back to reality. And this film is the
conjunction of two ways of doing films – I’m a documentary filmmaker, Jafar is a fiction filmmaker. It
was an improvisation and we proceeded step by step: discussing it, then doing it. It’s like Persian
music, which is based on improvisation. Without having to plan we knew certain things were going to
happen. For instance, the lunch delivery and the neighbor who always wants to leave her dog when
she goes out, and the garbageman who comes at 9 o’clock at night.
Q.
Why did you decide to make the film during the New Year celebrations?
A.
This is when the fire festival happens in Iran, and it’s a very old tradition that goes back 2500 years —
the government is against it because they say it is pagan but they haven’t been able to do anything.
As we couldn’t take our cameras outside we thought the celebrations could be a way to bring the city
inside. We are two filmmakers who share a social view of the cinema – we have always made social
films – and so we wanted a way to reflect society in the film.
Q.
Could you explain the significance of the title, “This Is Not a Film,” and also why the thank-you credits
are followed by blank spaces?
A.
We thought of the painting of Rene Magritte where he wrote “This Is Not a Pipe” and we thought it
would be appropriate to call a film about a filmmaker who can’t do a film “This Is Not a Film.” The
credits are blank for two reasons. We had some people who helped us with post-production but we
had to protect their identities so as not to harm them. And it also evokes something that the film is
supposed to be about: the loneliness of a filmmaker who is banned from working.
Martin Bureau
BBC NEWS
Cannes Film Festival to honour jailed Iranian directors
09/05/2011
Panahi's films include Offside, Crimson Gold and The Mirror
Jailed Iranian film directors Jafar Panahi and Mohammad Rasoulof are to be honoured at the Cannes
Film Festival.
Rasoulof's film Goodbye and Pahani's This Is Not a Film will be shown at the festival, organisers have
said.
Panahi will also be awarded the Carrosse d'Or - the Golden Coach prize - by the French Film
Director's Society (SRF) at the event.
The film-makers were convicted in December for working against the Iranian system, Panahi's lawyer
said.
Both men were sentenced to six years imprisonment in separate cases.
According to a statement released in Italy in November, Panahi had gone on trial in Iran accused of
making a film without permission and inciting opposition protests after the disputed 2009
presidential election that led to months of political turmoil.
Rasoulof was making a film with Panahi before his arrest.
The Iranian authorities maintained that his arrest was not political.
Panahi has been a vocal critic of Iran's strict Islamic law and government system, while his films are
known for their social commentary.
He is a winner of many international awards, most recently for his film Offside, which won the 2006
Berlin Film Festival's Silver Bear award.
The film-maker was due to be acting as a member of the jury at last year's Cannes Film Festival in
France. He was also prevented from attending the latest Venice film festival in September.
US film director Steven Spielberg and French actress Juliette Binoche have been among those who
have spoken out in his favour.
Cannes Film Festival organisers Gilles Jacob and Thierry Fremaux said of Panahi and Rasoulof: "That
they send them [the films] to Cannes, at the same time, the same year, when they face the same
fate, is an act of courage along with an incredible artistic message."
The festival runs from 11 to 22 May.
Meanwhile, organisers of the Venice Film Festival have announced plans to honour Italian director
Marco Bellocchio at this year's event.
The 71-year-old will receive the Golden Lion for Lifetime Achievement in September for his "tireless"
work "exploring the shifting boundaries between himself, cinema and history".
HÜRRIYET
Turkey English Daily
09/05/2011
Convicted Iranian filmmakers to feature at Cannes
It is an act of courage that two directors sent their films at this time, on top of the incredible artistic
message they include, said a statement from the organizers of the Cannes Film Festival who will
screen this May two films made undercover in Iran by two filmmakers who have been convicted for
practicing their art.
Films by two convicted Iranian directors, Jafar Panahi and Mohammad Rasoulof, made in "semiclandestine conditions," will be shown at this month's Cannes Film Festival. Panahi's "In Film Nist"
(This is not a Film), will be included in the official selection and screened on May 20. Rasoulof's "Be
Omid e Didar" (Goodbye) will screen on May 14 in the parallel with the Un Certain Regard section of
the festival. The organizers said the two films had only recently arrived at the festival.
"Mohammad Rasoulof's film and the conditions under which it was made, Jafar Panahi's 'diary' of the
days of his life as an artist not allowed to work, are by their very existence a resistance to the legal
actions that affect them," said a statement.
"That they send the films to Cannes, at the same time, the same year, when they face the same fate
is an act of courage along with an incredible artistic message."
"The reality of being alive and the dream of keeping cinema alive motivated us to go through the
existing limitations in Iranian cinema," said Panahi in a letter sent to the festival last week and read
out by the organizers.
"'In Film Nist' tells how, for months, Jafar Panahi waited for the verdict of his court appeal," the
statement said.
"Through the depiction of a day in his life, Jafar Panahi and Mojtaba Mirtahmasb, a documentary
filmmaker and former assistant director, we offer an overview of the current situation of Iranian
cinema."
Panahi, 50, was convicted of "propaganda against the system" for making a film about unrest after
the disputed re-election of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad in June 2009.
An Iranian court in December sentenced both directors to six years in prison and barred them from
making films for 20 years. They are free on bail pending an appeal, but forbidden to travel abroad.
Panahi in particular has been feted in his absence at foreign film festivals.
AFP
AL ARABIYA NEWS
08/05/2011
Cannes to show movies by two Iranian filmmakers who also happen to be convicts
Director Jafar Panahi after being released from the prison.
Films by two convicted Iranian filmmakers, Jafar Panahi and Mohammad Rasoulof, will be shown at
this month’s Cannes film festival, organizers said.
Mr. Panahi's “In Film Nist” (“This is not a Film”), will be included in the official selection and screened
on May 20, a statement said.
Mr. Rasoulof's “Be Omid e Didar” (“Goodbye”) will be shown on May 14 in the parallel Un Certain
Regard section of the festival.
“Mohammad Rasoulof's film and the conditions under which it was made, Jafar Panahi’s ‘diary’ of the
days of his life as an artist not allowed to work, are by their very existence a resistance to the legal
action which affects them,” according to AFP. “That they send them to Cannes, at the same time, the
same year, when they face the same fate, is an act of courage along with an incredible artistic
message.”
“The reality of being alive and the dream of keeping cinema alive motivated us to go through the
existing limitations in Iranian cinema,” the organizers quoted a letter from Mr. Panahi sent to the
festival on May 5 as saying.
“‘In Film Nist’ tells how, for months, Jafar Panahi waited for the verdict of his court appeal,” the
statement said to AFP.
“Through the depiction of a day in his life, Jafar Panahi and Mojtaba Mirtahmasb (a documentary
filmmaker and former assistant director), we offer an overview of the current situation of Iranian
cinema.”
“‘Be Omid e Didar,’” a feature film with Leyla Zareh, Fereshteh Sadreorafai, Shahab Hoseini and Roya
Teymorian, “is the story of a young lawyer in Tehran in search of a visa to leave the country, which is
what Mohammad Rasoulof did during the winter of 2010-2011.”
Hamid Dabashi, a professor of Iranian studies at Columbia University, told The Guardian in December
2010 that the sentence showed Iran’s leaders could not tolerate the arts.
“This is a catastrophe for Iran's cinema,” he said. “Panahi is now exactly in the most creative phase of
his life and by silencing him at this sensitive time, they are killing his art and talent.”
Professor Dabashi said: “What Iran is doing with the artists, is exactly similar to what Taliban did in
Afghanistan. This is exactly like bombing Buddha statues by the Taliban, Iran is doing the same with
its artists.”
Mr. Panahi, 50, was convicted of “propaganda against the system” for making a film about unrest
after the disputed re-election of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad in June 2009.
An Iranian court in December 2010 sentenced both directors to six years in prison and barred them
from making films for 20 years. They are free on bail pending an appeal, but forbidden to travel
abroad.
Mr. Panahi, in particular, has been feted in his absence at foreign film festivals: Berlin in February,
Venice in September and Cannes a year ago all invited him to sit on their juries, leaving a symbolic
empty chair for him when he was barred from leaving Iran.
Mr. Panahi is known for his gritty, socially critical movies such as “The Circle,” which bagged the 2000
Venice Golden Lion award, “Crimson Gold,” and “Offside,” winner of the 2006 Silver Bear at the
Berlin film festival.
Cannes had planned to show “Offside” this year, as well as hosting a forum on making films under a
dictatorship.
In an interview in September 2010, Mr. Panahi said: “When a film-maker does not make films it is as
if he is jailed. Even when he is freed from the small jail, he finds himself wandering in a larger jail.”
Ikram Al Yacoub
PRESS CONFERENCE – FESTIVAL DE CANNES
20/05/2011
Mojtaba Mirtahmasb: "We prefer being free men than imprisoned heros"
Mojtaba Mirtahmasb © FIF/LH
The Press Conference of This is not a film (In Film Nist) with Mojtaba Mirtahmasb, co-director of the
film and Jafar Panahi (who is forbidden from leaving Iran, and so was listening to the conference on
Skype) and Serge Toubiana, director of the Cinémathèque Française.
About the film:
Mojtaba Mirtahmasb: "We are not able to film our society, so we point the camera at ourselves. We
didn't want to give up hope in the situation but use it to our advantage. We decided to take the
energy from this situation to make something out of it." Serge Toubiana: "It's a film about directing.
Directing is a mental process. A filmmaker makes a film in his head. When you have no cinema, you
can still dream up a film and that's what this magnificent film tells us."
Does censorship have a face?
Serge Toubiana: "It's a very important question. In reality, Iranian society is very complex. For a long
time cinema has been associated with the education of children, without any political perspective.
Today, cinema has become an element of resistance. Opposite us, there's a Minister of Culture, a
deputy Minister, a Head of Cinema. But above that, there's power and justice and the police, and
again above that there's religious power. Today, there are differences and struggles between politics
and religion. Us, the Festival de Cannes, the Cinémathèque Française, the SACD, are not political
organisations but organisations concerned with cinema. When Iranian power says that Jafar Panahi
and Mohammad Rasoulof are anti-national filmmakers, we reply that they are filmmakers who are
interested in Iranian society. We are on the side of cinema."
Mojtaba Mirtahmasb: "We prefer being free men than imprisoned heros. We are not political
combatants. We are directors."
About Jafar Panahi
Mojtaba Mirtahmasb: "With this film, it's coming out and being screened at Cannes, and after
several years without having made a fil;, Jafar Panahi's morale is through the roof."
GULF TIMES
Cannes to screen convicted Iran directors’ films
Films by two convicted Iranian directors, Jafar Panahi and Mohamed Rasoulof, made in “semiclandestine conditions”, will be shown at this month’s Cannes film festival, organisers said yesterday.
Panahi’s In Film Nist (This is not a Film), will be included in the official selection and screened on May
20, a statement said.
Rasoulof’s Be Omid e Didar (Goodbye) will be shown on May 14 in the parallel Un Certain Regard
section of the festival.
The organisers said the two films had only reached the festival “in recent days.”
“Mohamed Rasoulof’s film and the conditions under which it was made, Jafar Panahi’s ‘diary’ of the
days of his life as an artist not allowed to work, are by their very existence a resistance to the legal
action which affects them,” said the statement.
“That they send them to Cannes, at the same time, the same year, when they face the same fate, is
an act of courage along with an incredible artistic message.”
“The reality of being alive and the dream of keeping cinema alive motivated us to go through the
existing limitations in Iranian cinema,” the organisers quoted a letter from Panahi sent to the festival
on May 5 as saying.
“In Film Nist tells how, for months, Jafar Panahi waited for the verdict of his court appeal,” the
statement said.
“Through the depiction of a day in his life, Jafar Panahi and Mojtaba Mirtahmasb (a documentary
filmmaker and former assistant director), we offer an overview of the current situation of Iranian
cinema.”
Be Omid e Didar a feature film with Leyla Zareh, Fereshteh Sadreorafai, Shahab Hoseini and Roya
Teymorian, “is the story of a young lawyer in Tehran in search of a visa to leave the country, which is
what Mohamed Rasoulof did during the winter of 2010-2011.”
Panahi, 50, was convicted of “propaganda against the system” for making a film about unrest after
the disputed re-election of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad in June 2009.
An Iranian court in December sentenced both directors to six years in prison and barred them from
making films for 20 years. They are free on bail pending an appeal, but forbidden to travel abroad.
Panahi in particular has been feted in his absence at foreign film festivals.
Berlin in February, Venice in September and Cannes a year ago all invited him to sit on their juries,
leaving a symbolic empty chair for him when he was barred from leaving Iran.
Panahi is known for his gritty, socially critical movies such as The Circle, which bagged the 2000
Venice Golden Lion award, Crimson Gold, and Offside, winner of the 2006 Silver Bear at the Berlin
film festival.
Cannes had planned to show Offside this year, as well as hosting a forum on making films under a
dictatorship.
AFP
THE WRAP
Imprisoned Iranian Filmmakers Added to Cannes Lineup
07/05/2011
Iranian director Jafar Panahi, whose imprisonment in Tehran prompted protests at last year's Cannes
Film Festival, has been added to this year's Cannes lineup with "In Film Nist" ("This is not a Film"), a
film diary shot on a day when he was waiting for his verdict.
Fellow Iranian director Mohammad Rasoulof, who like Panahi was stentenced to six years in prison
and barred from making films for 20 years for speaking out against the regime, has also been added
to the festival with "Bé Omid é Didar" ("Good Bye"), which deals with a young lawyer searching for a
visa to leave Tehran.
A Cannes press release on Saturday says the two films were "made in semi-clandestine conditions
and … reached the festival in recent days."
The films, said Cannes' Gilles Jacob and Thierry Fremaux, "are by their very existence a resistance to
the legal action which affects them. That they send them to Cannes, at the same time, the same year,
when they face the same fate, is an act of courage along with an incredible artistic message."
In a letter sent to the festival, Panahi (above) wrote, "The reality of being alive and the dream of
keeping cinema alive motivated us to go through the existing limitations in Iranian cinema."
Panahi's film will show as a special screening in the Official Selection, and will screen on Friday, May
20. Rasoulof's will be part of the Un Certain Regard section and will screen on Friday, May 13.
Panahi's films include the Cannes Camera d'Or winner "White Balloon" and Un Certain Regard winner
"Crimson Gold," as well as the Venice Film Festival winner "The Circle," which criticized the Irani
regime's treatment of women.
He was named a member of the jury at last year's Cannes, but was imprisoned and could not attend.
His chair was kept empty, and news surfaced during the festival that he had begun a hunger strike.
When Juliette Binoche won the festival's Best Actress award for a film by Iranian director Abbas
Kiarostami, she held up a sign bearing Panahi's name (right).
Panahi was released just after Cannes ended, but given a six-year sentence in December.
Rasoulof, whose films include "The Twilight" and "The White Meadows," was given the same
sentence that day.
The 2011 Cannes Film Festival begins on May 11 and runs through May 22.
Steve Pond
THE HOLLYWOOD REPORTER
07/05/2011
Jafar Panahi's "This is Not a Film" and Mohammad Rasoulof's "Goodbye" will screen in the Official
Selection and Un Certain Regard categories, respectively.
Gilles Jacob and Thierry Fremaux have raised the bars at this year's Festival de Cannes by announcing
last-minute entries to the official selection from imprisoned Iranian filmmakersJafar
Panahi and Mohammad Rasoulof, the fest said Saturday.
The directors will send their films made in semi-clandestine conditions to Cannes despite a six-year
prison sentence and 20-year employment ban. "The reality of being alive and the dream of keeping
cinema alive motivated us to go through the existing limitations in Iranian cinema," Panahi said in a
letter sent to the Festival on May 5th.
In Film Nist (This is Not a Film), directed by Panahi and Mojtaba Mirtahmas, will premiere on May
20th as a Special Screening in the Official Selection. This is Not a Film tells Panahi's story of waiting
for months for the verdict of his court appeal. Panahi added in his letter: "Our problems are also all
of our assets. Understanding this promising paradox helped us not to lose hope, and to be able to go
on since we believe wherever in the world that we live, we are going to face problems, big or small.
But it is our duty not to be defeated and to find solutions."
Rasoulof's Be Omid e Didar (Good Bye) will screen on May 13th in the Un Certain Regard category.
The film tells the story of a young lawyer in Tehran in search of a visa to leave the country, based on
the director's experience during the winter of 2010-2011.
"Mohammad Rasoulof's film and the conditions under which it was made, Jafar Panahi's 'diary' of the
days of his life as an artist not allowed to work, are by their very existence a resistance to the legal
action which affects them," Jacob and Fremaux said in a statement, adding: "That they send them to
Cannes, at the same time, the same year, when they face the same fate, is an act of courage along
with an incredible artistic message. Cannes is the international institution which protects them. Film
professionals from world over will gather on the Croisette and unite, we are sure, in a sort of selfevident fellowship." The Festival de Cannes kicks off on Wednesday, May 11th.
Rebecca Leffler
iIN
INDIA REPORT
CITY PRESS
FRANCE 24 INTERNATIONAL NEWS
Convicted Iranian film-makers to feature at Cannes
Iranian director Mohammad Rasoulof at a photocall during the 2009 San Sebastian International Film
Festival. Films by two convicted Iranian directors, Jafar Panahi and Mohammad Rasoulof, made in
"semi-clandestine conditions", will be shown at this month's Cannes film festival, organisers
announced.
A man walks past a poster featuring Iranian director Jafar Pahani in Berlin in February. Films by two
convicted Iranian directors, Jafar Panahi and Mohammad Rasoulof, made in "semi-clandestine
conditions", will be shown at this month's Cannes film festival, organisers announced.
AFP - Films by two convicted Iranian directors, Jafar Panahi and Mohammad Rasoulof, made in "semiclandestine conditions", will be shown at this month's Cannes film festival, organisers said Saturday.
Panahi's "In Film Nist" ("This is not a Film"), will be included in the official selection and screened on
May 20, a statement said.
Rasoulof's "Be Omid e Didar" ("Goodbye") will be shown on May 14 in the parallel Un Certain Regard
section of the festival.
The organisers said the two films had only reached the festival "in recent days."
"Mohammad Rasoulof's film and the conditions under which it was made, Jafar Panahi's 'diary' of the
days of his life as an artist not allowed to work, are by their very existence a resistance to the legal
action which affects them," said the statement.
"That they send them to Cannes, at the same time, the same year, when they face the same fate, is
an act of courage along with an incredible artistic message."
"The reality of being alive and the dream of keeping cinema alive motivated us to go through the
existing limitations in Iranian cinema," the organisers quoted a letter from Panahi sent to the festival
on May 5 as saying.
"'In Film Nist' tells how, for months, Jafar Panahi waited for the verdict of his court appeal," the
statement said.
"Through the depiction of a day in his life, Jafar Panahi and Mojtaba Mirtahmasb (a documentary
filmmaker and former assistant director), we offer an overview of the current situation of Iranian
cinema."
"Be Omid e Didar" a feature film with Leyla Zareh, Fereshteh Sadreorafai, Shahab Hoseini and Roya
Teymorian, "is the story of a young lawyer in Tehran in search of a visa to leave the country, which is
what Mohammad Rasoulof did during the winter of 2010-2011."
Panahi, 50, was convicted of "propaganda against the system" for making a film about unrest after
the disputed re-election of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad in June 2009.
An Iranian court in December sentenced both directors to six years in prison and barred them from
making films for 20 years. They are free on bail pending an appeal, but forbidden to travel abroad.
Panahi in particular has been feted in his absence at foreign film festivals.
Berlin in February, Venice in September and Cannes a year ago all invited him to sit on their juries,
leaving a symbolic empty chair for him when he was barred from leaving Iran.
Panahi is known for his gritty, socially critical movies such as "The Circle," which bagged the 2000
Venice Golden Lion award, "Crimson Gold," and "Offside," winner of the 2006 Silver Bear at the
Berlin film festival.
Cannes had planned to show "Offside" this year, as well as hosting a forum on making films under a
dictatorship.
THE TIMES
THE SUNDAY TIMES
Film world protests at detention of Iranian director Jafar Panahi
Artists from around the world yesterday called for the release of the Iranian film-maker Jafar Panahi,
who was arrested in a raid on his home in Tehran. The award-winning director, a vocal supporter of
the Opposition, was seized on Monday night along with his wife and daughter and 15 house guests.
“It is a very shocking development and further demonstration of the intolerance of the regime,” said
Ken Loach, the British director. “I hope all people working in films will call for his release, and speak
out in solidarity for him and all Iranian film-makers working under similar conditions. It is completely
unacceptable.”
Mr Panahi had supported Mir Hossein Mousavi, the Opposition leader, in last year’s disputed
parliamentary elections. He was arrested in July at a ceremony commemorating Neda Soltan, the
anti-Government protester who was killed by security forces after the rigged elections. Last month,
Mr Panahi was denied permission to leave Iran to attend the Berlin Film Festival.
“Jafar Panahi is a good friend, and all of us admire him, not only for his great gift of film-making but
for his amazing courage to be so vocal in Iran. He was never intimidated,” said Shirin Neshat, an
Iranian artist and filmmaker living in New York. “This action by the Government does not surprise us
Iranians. This regime has a habit of intimidating their people, their artists, so they learn to be silent.”
Mr Panahi’s work has received critical acclaim for its unflinching portrayal of social tensions in
contemporary Iran.
In 2000, he won the top prize at the Venice Film Festival for The Circle, which depicted women
struggling with the country’s inherent sexism. His most recent feature, Offside, depicted a group of
women defying a ban on them attending football matches, and attempting to enter the national
stadium disguised as men to watch a crucial World Cup qualifier. The film won the 2006 Silver Bear
award in Berlin.
Despite his international success, the critical stance in most of Mr Panahi’s work has led to conflict
with government censors. Most of his films are banned from being shown in Iranian cinemas.
Hugh Tomlinson
THE NEWS
21/05/2011
Jafar Panahi not in Cannes for This Is Not a Film premiere
Banned Iranian director who received prison sentence for criticising regime stars in movie smuggled
out of Iran
Most prints for films premiering at Cannes are delivered to the Croisette by private helicopter, or
clutched in the sweaty paws of their devoted directors. Jafar Panahi's new film, This Is Not a Film,
was smuggled into the country on a USB stick buried inside a cake posted from Iran to Paris.
Panahi, the virtuoso neo-realist who won a prize at Cannes for his debut, The White Balloon, in 1995,
and, at 50, now has one of the most sagging mantlepieces in cinema, is currently stuck in Iran,
awaiting the verdict of his appeal against a six-year prison term, and 20-year-ban on film-making,
talking to the press and travelling abroad. The sentence was passed in December 2010, after the
Iranian government accused him of "colluding with the intention to commit crimes against the
country's national security and propaganda against the Islamic Republic". Panahi denies the charges.
So This Is Not A Film was presented by its nominal director, Mojtaba Mirtahasebi, who spends a day
with Panahi in his high-rise apartment, sipping tea, chewing sugarlumps and watching the director
map out scenes from a screenplay he's been working on. It sounds earnest: in fact it's fantastically
entertaining, full of incidents that would be too far-fetched for the wildest farce: endless animals get
dumped on the director to babysit, for instance, including a 6ft iguana which paces the apartment
restlessly, as unhappy to be cooped up as his temporary master.
For most of the film, Panahi endeavours to exploit a loophole in his sentence by being in front of the
camera, rather than behind. But he becomes disillusioned with the project – "Why would you make a
film if you could just talk through it?" – and he's a compulsive director, filming his companion and
any visitors on his iPhone; documenting the scenes outside the window. The pair even manage to
have some fun with the censorship – the end credits give special thanks to a blank screen; that title
feels more tongue-in-cheek than drum-beating.
"We have a saying in Iran," said Mirtahasebi, "that when hairdressers get bored they cut each others'
hair. That is what we were doing: filming one another." The image is as amusing as it is poignant: for
both, simply the documentation of events is enough to make such a project valuable.
It's also a tool in lobbying round the world for Panahi's liberty. "I think making a film is like giving
birth to a child – it's a very complicated thing," said Mirtahasebi. "But I think at the same time to
spread it around is more difficult – it's like actually raising a child. And that is the function of festivals
like Cannes."
It is also the function of emerging technologies: Panahi speaks passionately about the role of the
digital world in creating lasting archives, even if they cannot be shared at the time. Mirtahasebi, too,
suggests that a familiarity with the online world gave them a natural advantage over the Iranian
establishment, which he suspected of ignorance about both cinema itself and the internet: "They
don't realise that they can't adapt it to fit their own vision." Indeed, Panahi watched the Cannes
press conference unfold through a Skype and an iPad camera – although all interaction was, by
necessity, one way.
His colleague, meanwhile, was visibly nervous to be presenting the film in public, eager to emphasise
how closely he needed to monitor his words to protect his own safety once he returns to Iran (even
the type of cake was information not deemed shareable). Solidarity with his colleague, he confirmed,
was a fraught business.
"We have decided to take the risks of what we're doing. Step by step, we are trying to fight. This has
a price. But we wanted to use that energy that is not being used in film-making. We didn't want to
give up."
Panahi's arrest in December was not his first. During last year's Cannes festival, Panahi was on
hunger strike in prison in Tehran to protest against being imprisoned on unspecified charges. The
actor Juliette Binoche paid tribute to him in an emotional press conference, and, accepting the best
actress award for Certified Copy (directed by the Iranian film-maker Abbas Kiarostami), held up a
placard bearing Panahi's name. These actions were widely believed to have aided his release less
than a week later.
But his freedom proved shortlived. One might have forgiven Mirtahasebi and Panahi for feeling
sceptical about the potential leverage of cinema. Martin Scorsese, Ken Loach, and thousands of
others have signed petitions and campaigned for his release. Yet to no apparent avail. Surely there
must be some disillusion? "Not at all," said Mirtahasebi. "Hope is what is guarding us. It's how we are
able to work and to carry on. Hope is the last thing we've got."
Catherine Shoard
STREET JOURNALIST
AMERICA’S LEADING FILMMAKERS CALL FOR RELEASE OF IMPRISONED IRANIAN DIRECTOR JAFAR
PANAHI
Steven Spielberg, Martin Scorsese, Robert Redford, Francis Ford Coppola, Terrence Malick, Steven
Soderbergh, the Coen Bros., Jim Jarmusch, Michael Moore, Ang Lee, Robert De Niro, and Oliver
Stone, among other leading film industry figures, have condemned the detention of Jafar Panahi, the
acclaimed director of “The White Balloon” and “Offside,” and are urging the Iranian government to
release him
New York, NY (April 30, 2010) – Jafar Panahi, an internationally acclaimed Iranian director of such
award-winning films as The White Balloon, The Circle, Crimson Gold and Offside, was arrested at his
home on March 1st and has been held since in Tehran’s notorious Evin prison. A number of
filmmaking luminaries have come to Mr. Panahi’s defense and “condemn his detention and strongly
urge the Iranian government to release Mr. Panahi immediately,” according to a new petition.
(Petition text and full list of signatories is available below.)
Islamic Republic officials initially charged Mr. Panahi with “unspecified crimes.” They have since
reversed themselves, and the charges now allege that he was making a film against the regime, a
very serious accusation in Iran.
Mr. Panahi’s films have been banned from screening in Iran for the past ten years and he has been
kept from working for the past four years, but he continues to stay in Iran.
“Mr. Panahi deeply loves his country,” says Jamsheed Akrami, an Iranian-American film scholar and
filmmaker, who helped organize the petition. “Even though he knows he could have opportunities to
work freely outside of his homeland, he has repeatedly refused to leave. He would never do anything
against the national interests of his country and his people.”
Mr. Panahi is one of the most heralded directors in the world. He has won such top prizes as the
Silver Bear at the Berlin International Film Festival forOffside (2006), the Un Certain Regard Prize at
the Cannes Film Festival forCrimson Gold (2003), the Golden Lion at the Venice Film Festival for The
Circle (2000), the Golden Leopard at the Locarno International Film Festival for The Mirror
(1997) and the Cannes Camera d’Or for The White Balloon (1995).
PETITION: Free Jafar Panahi
Jafar Panahi, the internationally acclaimed Iranian director of such award-winning films as The White
Balloon, The Circle, Crimson Gold and Offside, was arrested at his home on March 1st in a raid by
plain-clothed security forces. He has been held since then in Tehran’s notorious Evin prison.
A recent letter from Mr. Panahi’s wife expressed her deep concerns about her husband’s heart
condition, and about his having been moved to a smaller cell. Mr. Panahi’s films have been banned
from screening in Iran for the past ten years and he has effectively been kept from working for the
past four years. Last October, his passport was confiscated and he was banned from leaving the
country. Upon his arrest, Islamic Republic officials initially charged Mr. Panahi with “unspecified
crimes.” They have since reversed themselves, and the charges are now specifically related to his
work as a filmmaker.
We (the undersigned) stand in solidarity with a fellow filmmaker, condemn this detention, and
strongly urge the Iranian government to release Mr. Panahi immediately.
Iran’s contributions to international cinema have been rightfully heralded, and encouraged those of
us outside the country to respect and cherish its people and their stories. Like artists everywhere,
Iran’s filmmakers should be celebrated, not censored, repressed, and imprisoned.
Signed:
Paul Thomas Anderson
Joel & Ethan Coen
Francis Ford Coppola
Jonathan Demme
Robert De Niro
Curtis Hanson
Jim Jarmusch
Ang Lee
Richard Linklater
Terrence Malick
Michael Moore
Robert Redford
Martin Scorsese
James Schamus
Paul Schrader
Steven Soderbergh
Steven Spielberg
Oliver Stone
Frederick Wiseman
Petition Organizing Committee: Jamsheed Akrami, Godfrey Cheshire, Jem Cohen, Kent Jones,
Anthony Kaufman
Saeed Valadbaygi