Exclusive: 35th Fajr Film Festival, Day 5

ifilm’s exclusive report from the 5th day of the 35th Fajr Film Festival. Special guests include film director Mahdi Karampour, actress Elahe Hesari and director Maryam Dousti.

Below is a rough transcription of the report’s highlights.

ifilm: An exclusive interview by ifilm with Mahdi Karampour, an acclaimed director in Iranian Cinema. We’re going to talk to him; we’re going to talk about his films, and we’re going to see some of the people that have acted in his films.

Karampour: Others like Mr. Sharifinia, Mr. Siamak Safari and some others were people we had already worked with.

I don’t think anyone has shown the bazaar of Tehran like this in any movie before. It’s not just the bazaar but the most crowded places of Tehran are in our movie. It was really a tough and difficult job.

Hesari: Anyways, to me difference is beautiful in cinema. If all the movies were the same there won’t be any attraction in cinema.

Depending on the audiences’ tastes, some movies attract a large number of audiences but ‘Sophie and the Beast’ is the type of movie that if seen deeply will be your cup of tea. And I like it.

ifilm: It’s time to bring you another Cinema ifilm exclusive, which is an exclusive interview with Masoud Najafi, the head of public relations for the 35th Fajr Film Festival.

Najafi: Regarding the conditions at the Milad Tower, which was where journalists and reporters would gather, as a journalist, I was always unhappy with the conditions there and there were complaints about it every day on our radio program.

I wanted the journalists to have satisfying accommodations. Their main request is to see the movies at the Milar Tower in ideal conditions. This can greatly influence their perception, writings and opinions. When you see a movie under difficult circumstances, when there are no seats for you in the movie hall, or when you need to stand in line outside to get in, when it’s crowded everywhere... reporters and journalists are definitely affected by these issues. Sometimes I would see a movie when it was on general release and realize that my opinion of it was totally different from when I had seen it at the festival.

This year, we wanted good things to happen. Mr. Heydari and Mr. Ayoubi insisted on it. We considered more limitations while choosing the media personnel who could attend. We tried to choose professional and relevant ones.

ifilm: Let’s take a look at Maryam Dousti’s directorial debut. The name of the film is ‘Lake of Fishes’. The film recounts Saddam Hussein’s aggression upon Iran.

Dousti: I used to make short films before ‘Fish River’ and I was a makeup designer and a cinema teacher. My academic studies were in Sweden and England.

But I have a lot of experience in Iran’s cinema industry with many filmmakers and directors as a makeup artist or an artistic designer.

The focus of my movie is the loneliness of children of war. I think we need to change our views a little about war movies and Sacred Defense movies. We need to look at them differently.

AI/AG