Asghar Farhadi’s ‘The Salesman’ won the ARRI/Osram Award for the best international film at the closing ceremony of the Munich International Film Festival (Filmfest MUNCHEN) on Saturday, July 2, in Germany.
One of the contenders in the CineMasters Competition section, the film was unanimously elected by the jury to receive the top award of the festival, Mehr News Agency reported.
“We choose to give the award to a film that we found contemporary and yet universal and, most importantly, an opening to the future. A story that was both thrilling and full of surprises; a film about who we are and could be as human beings,” said the jury statement.
“’The Salesman’ presents us with an alternative to the predominant masculine approach of attempting to solve problems with violence and revenge. The beauty we found in the film is that it shows a path towards solutions through the feminine way of thinking and feeling, with intelligence not only of the mind, but also the heart,” the jury further said.
It is the second major prize for the movie which debuted at the 69th Cannes Film Festival in May and won the Best Actor award for Shahab Hosseini and best screenplay award for Farhadi.
A 2016 joint production of Farhadi and the French company Memento Films Production, the movie centers on Emad and Rana (a young couple) who move into a new flat in the center of Tehran, but an incident linked to the previous tenant dramatically changes their life.
Besides Hosseini, Taraneh Alidoosti, Babak Karimi, Farid Sajjadihosseini and Mina Sadati are in the cast.
Established in 1983, the festival is a principal summer film festival in Munich with over 80,000 admissions every year. Over 2,000 film industry professionals from around the world and over 500 members of the press are accredited annually. The event screens over 200 feature films, documentaries and TV movies each year.
Iranian distributor Filmiran has purchased the right for the local release of Farhadi’s 7th feature film. CEO Ali Sartipi said, “The film screening will start in Europe and the US from September, and we will try to release it in Iran as soon as possible.”
Memento Films will distribute it in Europe while Amazon has purchased the rights for the US release.
Many cinema experts believe that if shown in the country until the end of summer, ‘The Salesman’ has high potential to be Iran’s submission to the Oscars for the best foreign language Film.
