Two Iranian documentaries produced by the Documentary and Experimental Film Center (DEFC) in Tehran have won awards at two European festivals in the Czech Republic and Italy.
‘Skipper Soleyman’, a 25-min social-environmental documentary, directed by Saadatali Saeedpour in 2015, won the Best Short Documentary Prize at the 42nd International Film Festival of EKOFILM 2016 held in the Czech Republic, Mehr News Agency reported.
The documentary centers on environmental issues of Lake Urmia in Iran. Due to the gradual drying up of the lake, Captain Soleyman abandons his grounded ship and takes up farming.
The 9th edition of the Iranian international festival for documentary films, Cinéma Vérité, featured ‘Skipper Soleyman’ in 2015.
EKOFILM, held on October 13-15 in Brno, is one of the oldest environmentally-based film festivals. The Czech festival is a popular event for both professionals and the general audience with environmental concerns.
‘Atlan’, a 62-minute social docudrama, directed by Moeen Karimoddini in 2015, won the Best Long Documentary Prize at the 4th edition of FRONTDOC 2016 in Aosta, Italy.
Atlan tells the story of Ali, a Turkmen horse trainer. Horses are his life, and Ilhan is the name of the horse that has won him many prizes. To fund his wedding, Ali plans a series of races with Ilhan and other horses. In Turkmen language, Atlan means ‘mount and set off’.
FRONTDOC is an international festival of documentary films highlighting geographical, political, social and cultural borders, encouraging film makers to explore new frontiers between documentary genre and other means of expression.
Major Promoter in Middle East
The DEFC is among the major centers for production, distribution and promotion of documentary, animated and experimental pictures in the Middle East.
In the past 12 months, DEFC has produced nearly 120 documentary titles and 10 animated pictures, according to its website defc.ir.
DEFC is also actively involved in co-production of documentary projects with international producers and TV channels.
It provides film festivals, film markets, TV Channels, theaters, universities, institutes and other similar events with the most recent Iranian documentary, animated and experimental productions, and sometimes feature films.
DEFC organizes the highly-acclaimed annual Cinéma Vérité, a festival that tries to express the relationship between reality and truth through documentary films.
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