Highlights of this year’s Iranian Film Festival program of twelve features include the latest films from a number of Iran’s most prominent directors including Jafar Panahi’s 3 FACES (Winner, Best Screenplay at Cannes 2018 ) and Bahmam Farmanara’s TALE OF THE SEA (2018 Moscow Film Festival)), along with the exciting work of new generation filmmakers such as Abbas Amini’s HENDI & HORMOZ (2018 Berlinale) & Mostafa Sayari’s AS I LAY DYING (Venice Film Fest 2018).
Iranian Film Festival Australia Director Armin Miladi said, “Despite political and economic challenges, 2018 has been a great year for Iranian Cinema on the international stage and we are delighted to expand the festival’s reach this year, bringing one of our best selections yet of contemporary Iranian cinema to a wide audience. Iranian cinema is recognised internationally for its minimalism and emotional directness, but there is also a growing Iranian audience for comedy and we are excited to present two of the first comedies to make it onto the International stage; PIG by Mani Haghighi which was selected for Berlinale’s Main competition and SLY by Kamal Tabrizi which screened at the Busan Film Festival.
Dedicated to the late great Abbas Kiarostami, Tale of The Sea is an elegiac family drama from veteran director Bahman Farmanara. It follows Taher Mohebi, a famous writer who is finally leaving a mental institution after three years unable to deal with the world. Upon release, he returns with his wife to his home by the sea, a place where past and present blur in delicate and deeply moving ways.
Winner of Best Screenplay at this year’s Cannes Festival, Three Faces is the latest gentle giant in the oeuvre of renowned dissident filmmaker Jafar Panahi. Again splicing documentary and fiction to dazzling effect, Panahi stars alongside the famous Iranian actress Behnaz Jafari in this road movie meditation on women’s roles in Iranian life and cinema.
Subverting conventional expectations of Iranian cinema, PIG by mischief-maker Mani Haghighi is a dark comedy with real socio-political bite. Making its premiere in Competition at this year’s Berlinale, this hilarious satire trails a blacklisted director who hasn’t been able to make a film in years. His bad luck turns to worse when he becomes the prime suspect in a murder case.
Making its Australian premiere, direct from its debut at the Venice International Film Festival, As I Lay Dying is the debut feature from Mostafa Sayari, who reimagines William Faulkner’s classic gothic tale in contemporary rural Iran. Four siblings drive their father’s corpse to a remote village in order to fulfil his burial wishes, but the unbearable experience stirs up old tensions.
Debuting at this year’s Berlinale, Hendi and Hormoz follows the young eponymous couple, aged 13 and 16 respectively, who live on the island of Hormuz in the Persian Gulf and marry according to traditional custom. The second fiction feature from Abbas Amini follows their initial joy together, before she becomes pregnant and things take a turn for the worse. Australian premiere.
Iranian Film Festival Australia – 2018 Dates
18-22 Oct • SYDNEY, Event Cinemas Top Ryde
19-23 Oct • SYDNEY, Dendy Newtown