Mannheim-Heidelberg Filmfest to host ‘Rona, Azim’s Mother’

Iran is to attend the 68th edition of the Mannheim-Heidelberg Int'l Film Festival in Germany with ‘Rona, Azim’s Mother’.

Directed and written by Jamshid Mahmoudi, ‘Rona, Azim’s Mother’ will vie at two competition sections of the festival. The winners of this section will be awarded with the Grand Newcomer Award as well as the Talent Award.

Mahmoudi, the director, will also attend the screening of his movie.

‘Rona, Azim’s Mother’ is an 89-minute Iran-Afghan co-production which narrates the story of Azim, an Afghan refugee who lives in Tehran along with his family and works at Tehran municipality at night.

Being the family’s head, he must choose between his own life and his mother’s whom he claims is the most important one in his life, as he found out that she is in dire need of kidney transplant.

Among the cast team are Mohsen Tanabandeh, Mojtaba Pirzadeh, Fatemeh Hosseini, Fereshteh Hosseini and Fatemeh Mirzaee.

Mohsen Tanabandeh has been recently nominated for best actor award at Asia Pacific Screen Awards for his performance in ‘Rona, Azim’s Mother’.

The film has won Kim Jiseok Award at the 23rd Busan International Film Festival in South Korea, two awards at the Diorama International Film Festival in India, the Grand Prix of the International Jury and the INALCO (Asian Studies University in Paris) award at the 25th Vesoul International Film Festival of Asian Cinema in France, best film award at the 3rd Sharm el-Sheikh Asian Film Festival in Egypt, and Best Afghan Feature Film at the 3rd Sama International Film Festival in Sweden.

The movie has also gone on screen at some global film events, including the 29th Annual Festival of Films from Iran in the US.

Established in 1952, Mannheim-Heidelberg International Filmfestival is an annual film festival which presents films of international newcomer directors.

It is the second-oldest film festival in Germany (the oldest being Berlin).

The event is scheduled for November 14-24, 2019 in two German cities of Heidelberg and Mannheim.

MM/FM