The Case of the Producer Who Was Whipped at the Ministry of Culture

Recently, two Iranian film producers criticized the conditions of Iranian cinema in the 1980s, recounting the story of the imprisonment and whipping of some cinema professionals in the Ministry of Culture during that decade. A few days ago, following the unveiling of a book of interviews and speeches by Mohammad Beheshti, a former cinema manager in the 1980s, Hossein Farahbakhsh, a producer and director, claimed that some Iranian filmmakers were imprisoned and whipped in the Ministry of Culture in the early 1980s. Farahbakhsh specifically referred to his friend and colleague, Abdollah Alikhani, who, according to Farahbakhsh, was imprisoned for a week and whipped for having foreign films. Farahbakhsh stated, 'Unfortunately, some managers of the 1980s tortured Mr. Abdollah Alikhani in the upper floor of the Ministry of Culture, and there is evidence of that. While these managers claim that they did not harm anyone at that time.' After this conversation, a reporter from the Tabnak website approached Abdollah Alikhani to discuss the details of the events that occurred during those years. This cinema producer pointed out that these events took place during the tenure of Fakhruddin Anvar as the cinema deputy in 1984, saying, 'For several years after the revolution, foreign films were still being screened in Iranian cinemas, and some of those films were in my possession and that of other producers. Mr. Anvar and his colleagues set a deadline in 1984, according to which we had to submit documents for foreign films to the Ministry of Culture; however, the time allocated for this was very short, and it was not possible to undertake such an action in that brief time.' This cinema distributor explained that he and about 20 other filmmakers went to the Ministry to protest the short deadline, stating, 'After this, suddenly, they stormed my office from the office of the director of security at the Ministry of Culture and took me to the security department of the Ministry of Culture — which was one floor below the minister's office — and imprisoned me for a week. Of course, I was not the only one; others were also taken.' He described the events that occurred during that week, saying, 'During this time, I was subjected to a method called 'chicken kebab' (a specific method where a person is bound like a chicken so that they cannot escape blows). In addition, they whipped the soles of my feet and told me to walk on the tiles so that bruising would not occur. I could not believe that such an event was happening to me in the Ministry of Culture.' Mr. Alikhani also responded to whether the officers had a judicial order at the time of his arrest, adding, 'As far as I know, the Ministry of Culture has no responsibility for arrests, and the Ministry is not a place for detention; I did not see any order, but at that time, the security had weapons and came with radios and Kalashnikovs, and naturally, I had to go with them.' In the end, this cinema producer spoke about pursuing legal action regarding this matter, saying, 'For two years after that, we went to court, and then we were told to write a letter saying we made a mistake and that the films were vulgar, or else we would go to prison; we wrote it due to the atmosphere of that time. After that, they had such a deterrent that we no longer dared to pursue legal action.' The responsibility of the Ministry of Culture from 1979 to 1981 was with Abbas Dozdouzan, from 1981 to 1982 with Abdolmajid Maadi Khaah, and from 1982 to 1991 with Mohammad Khatami. Additionally, the responsibility of the cinema deputy of the Ministry of Culture was held by Fakhruddin Anvar from 1983 to 1993, and Mohammad Beheshti was the head of the Farabi Cinema Foundation from 1983 to 1994. So far, none of the former officials of the cinema deputy and the Ministry of Culture have reacted to the statements of Abdollah Alikhani and Hossein Farahbakhsh and have not commented on this matter.