Roundtable on Censorship and Challenges of Independent Cinema in Iran Held with Iranian Filmmakers at Cannes Film Festival

A roundtable on censorship and the challenges of independent cinema in Iran was held with several prominent Iranian filmmakers on the sidelines of the Cannes Film Festival. According to Variety, the event, hosted by Sahar Bagheri, a manager in Amazon's France division, featured personalities such as Zar Amir-Ebrahimi, actress, Sepideh Farsi, director, Milad Alami, director, and Kaveh Farnam, producer. This session took place amid ongoing nationwide protests in Iran that began following the death of Mahsa Amini. The death of this young girl, who was in the custody of Iran's morality police, quickly spread across the country but did not lead to the downfall of the Iranian regime. In recent months, the government has arrested several Iranian filmmakers, artists, and dissidents, including Jafar Panahi and Mohammad Rasoulof. Although these two prominent filmmakers were recently released, Mohammad Rasoulof was unable to travel to France for the Cannes jury due to a travel ban. Sahar Bagheri stated in this session, 'Iran is experiencing the largest repression in the history of Iranian cinema. You can be arrested, imprisoned, and held without any judgment. Even if you win international awards, you can remain safe for a while, then one day you will be stopped at the airport and your passport will be taken. It is like an unpredictable quicksand.' In this roundtable, Asal Bagheri, a researcher, referred to the polarization of Iranian cinema, meaning the political Iranian films that travel to festivals, and the domestic entertaining works of the mainstream that have a close relationship with the government and the Islamic regime. She stated that Iranian cinema has become an important voice of resistance in Iran since the late 1980s, managing to circumvent censorship, saying, 'One of the significant developments in Iranian cinema is the representation of women.' According to Ms. Bagheri, until the end of the 1980s, the Islamic Republic 'wanted to prevent the modern representation of Iranian society,' but it failed. The researcher added, 'Single parents, divorced families, and women's struggles for their rights have become the forefront of Iranian cinema.' She expressed that she was not surprised to see 'all these brave women at the forefront of protests.' Sepideh Farsi, whose latest film, the political animation 'Pari Abadan,' opened the Panorama section of the Berlin Film Festival this year, spoke about her experience with censorship in her 2006 film 'Negah' in Iran. She depicted the story of a leftist intellectual who returns to Iran after exile in Paris. Ms. Farsi stated that she initially tried to comply with the laws to have her films seen by people inside Iran, but 'this never happened because they were all censored.' The director continued that she received filming permission for this work but was not granted a screening permit. Sepideh Farsi said, 'The most problematic part of the film for the government was not the background of the leftist character returning from exile, nor the metaphor of the repression of opponents in the 1980s, but the final scene of the film because a single couple cannot book a room in a hotel.' After refusing to censor this scene, she mentioned that she went to the Rotterdam Film Festival for the global screening of the film. She added, 'This film was later screened outside Iran, in France and other countries, and of course, because I could no longer make films in Iran, I faced problems.' Sepideh Farsi also directed the film 'Red Rose' about the protests that erupted over the results of the 2009 presidential election in Iran. She said that this film examines how the youth protested in the streets and used social media. Ms. Farsi further added, 'I am glad to say that Iranian filmmakers inside Iran are breaking this wall to show that Iranian society is very complex.' Kaveh Farnam, who has produced many films including works by Mohammad Rasoulof, stated that Iranians have faced 'the problem of censorship' for the past hundred years. He continued, 'We always try to somehow cope with censorship. We try to find a solution, we hide our identity, we hide touching, etc., but what we have learned after all these years is that the way to cope with censorship is to not accept it at all.' Zar Amir-Ebrahimi, who won the Best Actress award at Cannes for her role in 'Holy Spider' by Ali Abbasi last year, also worked as an assistant producer on this film. She said, 'Using a well-known Iranian actress for this film was very important. When you deal with European producers, they argue that since your audience is Iranian, it doesn't matter if the actor has an accent or if the location doesn't look right.' Ms. Ebrahimi added, 'The acting process for 'Holy Spider' took almost three years. Ali went to Iran, and we only arranged a week of rehearsals and auditions. It was surprising that many actors and crew members living in Iran, despite knowing that this was a risky project, were interested in working on the film.' According to this actress, addressing such a subject was sensitive for the Iranian government, and Mehdi Bajestani has never returned to Iran since acting in this film and is now residing in Europe. Milad Alami, whose second film 'Mokhalef' was screened at the Berlin Film Festival, stated that both 'Mokhalef' and his first film 'Afsongar' address 'the refugee system in Sweden and Denmark and its incompleteness and critique the Iranian regime and how it threatens people.' He, who fled Iran with his family in 1987, noted that both of his films were co-productions. According to Mr. Alami, 'Making these films in Iran is impossible. Both are about men whose only currency is their bodies and deal with intimacy, sexual desires, violence, and freedom.' He added, 'As I got older, I felt responsible for the memories of those trapped in that system who cannot speak, to tell stories about this regime.' Most Iranian filmmakers, like Milad Alami or Ali Abbasi, now collaborate with international partners and organizations. The members of this roundtable and attendees also observed a minute of silence to honor Majid Kazemi, Saleh Mirhashimi, and Saeed Yaqoubi, three imprisoned protesters who were executed by the Iranian government last week.