Exclusive report on ‘Arvand’

Watch ifilm's exclusive report on ‘Arvand’, with director Pourya Azarbayjani and producer Mehdi Davari.

Below are highlights of the report.

ifilm: Most filmmakers who make films about the war have experienced the war themselves, but Pourya Azarbayjani is one of the few filmmakers who was a child back then but he’s made a film about the Sacred Defense.

Azarbayjani: I was born in 1981 and I experienced the Eight-Year War, but in the city. I mean, I was a child during the war, even before I went to school.

So, all my childhood paintings were about bombs, tanks and airplanes; the way I experienced the war is a bit different from the way other people experienced it.

ifilm: The movie ‘Arvand’ was supposed to be a film about the Sacred Defense, but as the screenplay was being written the bodies of the 175 military divers were recovered and it’s become what we see today.

One of the good things about this movie is that it’s narrated in two different eras: events unfold in the past and the present.

Azarbayjani: You know, I like the stream of consciousness very much and my interest comes from literature rather than cinema.

I like Abbas Maroufi’s books very much, also Golshiri’s. They would mostly use the stream of consciousness in their works, also, in cinema, the person who I like very much and believe his narration is close to the stream of consciousness; it’s not the exact thing but it’s very close to it. It’s a ‘Journey to Chazabe’.

I think it’s Rasoul Mola-Qolipour’s best war movie. I think it’s the best movie about the Sacred Defense so far. Because of that, I thought we could use this narration style in this film as well.

ifilm: Mehdi Davari was involved in the Eight-Year War and he thinks the movie ‘Arvand’ is a kind of homage to the Sacred Defense.

Davari: Anyhow, we had our own ideas about this genre and we felt that we should work on it more. We tried to be active in this genre to pay homage to the Sacred Defense.

It’s because of the behaviors we witness in the society these days which are in contrast to what the martyrs and war veterans believed in and fought for. We felt indebted to them and tried to make up for it.

ifilm: You should note that ‘Arvand’ faced many, many obstacles.

Davari: We faced many serious problems during the production period. We couldn’t solve them.

With the positive vibes we received from the martyred divers, we were able to overcome them.

For example, one day before the shooting began, we hadn’t received the pool we were promised.

But the next day we got it from someplace else and the film crew started to shoot, and they really worked day and night. I think the martyrs will help us and the film will become what it should be.

AI/AI