Iranian Cinema Flourishing
Iran’s film industry has long been considered one of a kind for the frank minimalism and acute emotional directness of its films.
The Iranian cinema and is also recognized for its moral values, rural attractiveness and poetic elegance and thanks to the Iranian cinema's recent alluring achievements, its role could not be easily overlooked due to its domestic and international fans.
One of the contributors to film industry includes Fajr Film Festival which is the country's largest annual film festival. Although the Fajr festival is an international event, its domestic and international sections are held separately at a three-month interval. This year the local section of the 37th edition of Fajr Film Festival is being held in Tehran from the 37th year from 30 Jan. to 11 Feb. 2019.
The country's cinema industry emerged in 1962 by "House Is Black" directed by Iranian poetess Forough Farrokhzad. The film portrays life and suffering in a leper colony.
Later on, the tradition of producing astonishing films showcasing humanist qualities of the Iranian civilization was taken ahead by Dariush Mehrjui in his film "The Cow" (1969), which narrates a rural villager who is so infatuated with his cow that upon hearing of the animal’s death he adopts its identity.
The cinema began to re-emerge again when filmmakers like late internationally-acclaimed film director Abbas Kiarostami and Majid Majidi started producing children movies.
The triumph of the 1979 Islamic Revolution encouraged a whole new generation of Iranian filmmakers, including female directors.
As a result, the post-revolution films focused on children movies which were produced based on true stories, lyrical, magical drama, real-life troubles, documentary footage, etc.
In a meantime, war cinema was also born along with the outbreak of eight-year war imposed on the Islamic Republic in 1980s. The movies produced during this era portrayed the most poematic view on the Iran-Iraq war and still after years, is one of the leading films about this historical event from a humanistic aspect.
In the past 20 years, Iranian cinema industry has flourished beyond expectations. Recently, Iran has been praised as one of the preeminent creators of cinema since 1990.
Some cinema critics consider Iran as the world’s most crucial national cinema, artistically, with a significance that invites comparison to Italian neorealism, French new wave and similar cinematic movements of the past.
** Contemporary Iranian Cinema:
Contemporary Iranian cinema is an emblem of the country's civilization, culture and art which is considered as a vanguard of the dialogue among civilizations and a symbol of innovative Iranian mind.
Hardly any international film gatherings have been held without the partaking of a film from Iran.
So far the Iranian films have managed to win top prestigious prizes of many festivals.
For instance, the late Kiarostami short and feature films have been a key contributor to introduce Iran in renowned International festivals.
Although Iranian cinema does not employ the state-of-art technologies and professional facilities compared with the US and European cinema, it has recently shined in large number of global festivals.
So far, the Iranian cinema has shined in international festival and snatched several prizes in several prestigious cinematic events, including Cannes International Film Festival, Academy Awards Oscar Venice, International Film Festival as well as Berlin International Film Festival, etc.
Founded in 1982, Fajr Film Festival has been honored by numerous great film figures who have also worked closely with the festival as respectable jury members, such as German filmmaker Volker Schlondorff, Polish film and theatre director, producer and screenwriter Krzysztof Zanussi, American film producer and philanthropist Robert Chartoff, Turkish screenwriter, film director and producer SemihKaplanoglu, Australian film director Bruce Beresford, German director, screenwriter, and producer Percy Adlon, Dutch-Australian filmmaker Paul Cox, Indian director and screenwriter ShyamBenegal, Hungarian film director BelaTarr, Swedish film director Jan Troell, etc, just to name a few among other influential figures over the past years.
