The 35th Fajr International Film Festival (FIFF) to be held in April in Tehran will pay tribute to the late auteur Abbas Kiarostami, who died July at the age of 76 in Paris.
The celebrated filmmaker was supposed to be among the organizers of the 34th FIFF last year but at the time he was hospitalized for surgery.
According to the festival’s public relations office, the upcoming edition of Iran’s major annual film event will pay homage posthumously to Kiarostami at a special ceremony titled ‘Here is the Friend’s Home’. The title refers to Kiarostami’s acclaimed movie ‘Where Is the Friend’s Home?’ which won the Bronze Leopard at the 1989 Locarno Film Festival, Switzerland.
The official festival poster is also using a photo from Kiarostami’s ‘Snow’ collection. Designed by the graphic designer Hamidreza Beydaqi, it shows trees, hills, snow, and the empty horizon on a cold day.
Kiarostami is the only Iranian director who won the Palme d’Or at the Cannes Film Festival. He was awarded the prize in 1997 for ‘Taste of Cherry’.
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The FIFF celebrates cultural exchange, displays creative achievements of highly acclaimed cineastes and pays tribute to quality local and international films. Since its establishment, the festival has played a vital role in the development of Iran Cinema.
The festival will not “screen any film in the competition section if it has already been screened at other festivals or had a public screening,” said Jafar Sanei Moqaddam, FIFF planning director.
As he said, the festival has no selecting committee, but panelists who will watch and evaluate all Iranian film entries before sending the final list to the secretariat. They will select three feature length films and two short Iranian films for the ‘International Competition’ and ‘Asia and Islamic Countries’ competition sections respectively.
Speaking about the documentary section titled ‘Under the Magnifying Glass’, Sanei Moqaddam said it is a non-competitive section where selected Iranian and foreign documentaries will be shown.
The time for submission of films and also registration of press members and critics in the festival website, which started from October 1, 2016, ended on March 10 and the festival will be held from April 21-28 at Charsou Cineplex, in downtown Tehran, just like last year.
It will also host the 20th Iranian International Film Market, the talent-finding workshops and press briefings. Similar to the previous edition, renowned filmmaker Reza Mirkarimi is secretary of the festival.
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