Asghar Farhadi’s ‘The Salesman’ has been selected as Iran’s nominee for the best foreign language film at the 2017 Oscars.
Farhadi’s latest film which is currently on screen in Iranian cinemas will represent the nation at the 89th Academy Awards, the Farabi Cinema Foundation announced on Saturday.
The film was selected from a list of 8 titles that included festival favorites such as ‘A Dragon Arrives’, ‘The Daughter’, ‘Nahid’ and ‘Wednesday, May 9’. A jury of nine cineastes including filmmakers Pouran Derakhshandeh, Mohammad Bozorgnia and Shahram Mokri, critic Saeed Aqiqi and cinematographer Touraj Mansouri watched the shortlisted films and finally chose ‘The Salesman’ as the candidate that will be officially submitted to the Oscars soon.
So far, 48 nations have introduced their submissions to the Oscars. Many countries pick films that do well on their own festival circuit as their strongest Oscar contender. Accordingly, Farhadi’s film seems to be the best option as it won the best screenplay award for him as well as the best actor award for Shahab Hosseini at its world premiere at the 69th Cannes Film Festival in May. Later in July it also won the ARRI/Osram Award for the best international film at the Munich International Film Festival in Germany.
Farhadi’s ‘A Separation’ became the first Iranian film to win the Academy Awards in the category back in 2012.
Last year’s winner of the best foreign language film in the Oscars was Hungarian Cannes prize-winner ‘Son of Saul’. Therefore, with one Oscar already won and the Cannes prize this year plus the rave reviews by foreign critics, winning another Oscar does not seem far-fetched.
The famous prediction website awardscircuit.com has already put ‘The Salesman’ among one of the final five nominees in the category.
The other potentials among the submissions include ‘Toni Erdmann’ from Germany, ‘Neruda’ from Chile, ‘From Afar’ from Venezuela and ‘Julieta’ from Spain.
‘The Salesman’ is a quiet suspense/thriller about a man (Hosseini) struggling with his desire for vengeance after his wife (Taraneh Alidoosti) is assaulted in their home.
It is a joint production of Farhadi and the French company Memento Films Production. Babak Karimi, Farid Sajjadihosseini and Mina Sadati are also in the cast.
Memento Films will distribute it in Europe while Amazon has purchased the rights for the US release.
Screening for 16 days in Iran, it has taken in over $1.5 million (52 billion rials). It was debuted locally and took in sales of $353,000 (12.3 billion rials) in the first three days of the opening, shattering the previous records in Iran’s cinema history.
This year’s deadline for foreign submissions to the Oscars is October 3. The Academy members will vote from January 5 to 13, 2017 and the final nominees will be announced on January 24. The final evaluations of the shortlisted candidates to choose the top winners will take place February 13-21. The awards ceremony is slated for January 26 at the Dolby Theater in Los Angeles.
