36th FIff to honor Cambodian director

Fajr International Film Festival is set to present the Fajr Peace Award to writer-director Rithy Panh from Cambodia.

The Cambodian director will receive the award in Tehran for his cinematic works which mostly focus on humanitarian issues.

The Fajr Peace Award aims to raise awareness for the social relevance of films, and to make active use of the influence of movies and documentaries on the perception and resolution of global social, political and humanitarian challenges, the FIff website wrote.

Panh graduated from the Institut des Hautes Etudes Cinématographiques (Institute for the Advanced Cinematographic Studies) in France. He returned to Cambodia in 1990, while still using Paris as a home base.

His first documentary feature film ‘Site 2’ was awarded Grand Prix du Documentaire at the Festival of Amiens in France.

His 1994 film ‘Rice People’ is a docudrama narrative about a rural family struggling with life in Cambodia. It was in competition at the 1994 Cannes Film Festival, and was submitted to the 67th Academy Awards for Best Foreign Language Film, the first time a Cambodian film had been submitted to the Oscars.

His 2013 documentary film ‘The Missing Picture’ was screened in the Un Certain Regard section of Cannes Film Festival where it won the top prize. It won the Lumières Award for Best Documentary at the 21st Lumières Awards and was nominated for the César Award for Best Documentary Film at the 41st César Awards.

The film was nominated for the Best Foreign Language Film at the 86th Academy Awards too.

Directed by Reza Mirkarimi, the 36th edition of the festival is slated for April 19-27, 2018, in the Iranian capital city of Tehran.

MG/AG