Exclusive: 35th Fajr Film Festival, Day 7

ifilm’s exclusive report from the 7th day of the 35th Fajr Film Festival.

ifilm: Welcome to another edition of Cinema ifilm from the 35th Fajr Film Festival. I want to tell you about the second directorial debut of Mohammad Hossein Mahdavian. The film depicts what was going on in Iran in 1982. I heard it’s a wonderful film.

Mohammad Hossein Mahdavian, director: I’m delighted because during the past few days the reaction of people has been amazing. I expected the audience to like it because we did our best to make a profound and interesting film which suits the silver screen; a feature film that grabs the attention of the audience.

However, this much positive reaction, extra screening hours, the reaction of people in the cinema halls were all way more than what we expected.

Mehdi Zamin Pardaz, actor: This was the second time I saw the movie; one time I saw it with people at Azadi tower, it was interesting for me, the reaction of the people was great, because I wanted to see whether the people will follow the movie till the end.

However, I was told that it was warmly welcomed but when I went to the cinema hall I saw that it’s true, they all sit tight till the very end of the film.

Javad Ezzati, actor: You might think that I’m exaggerating but to tell you the truth I didn’t hear any negative comments about the movie. Some say that they don’t tell us the negative comments. It’s true. But among twenty people one might have negative reactions, it’s natural. Thank God it didn’t happen in this movie.

Seyyed Mahmoud Razavi, producer: We only need the audience to believe that atmosphere and with regards to our film, they did and so did those who were involved in the media.

Last year, we worked on the movie ‘Cyanide’ and Mr. Mahdavian had worked on ‘Standing in the Dust’. The warm welcome of the audiences and those involved in the media showed us that the atmosphere is ready for those projects to be worked on. Before that it was very difficult to work on these subjects. I mean whether the people prepared for these movies or whether actors/actresses were ready to star in them because of the pressure on them and also the media atmosphere.

Ahmad Mehranfar, actor: Not many films have been made on our contemporary history. For me, it was a terrifying experience. It had many different reasons and I don’t want to mention them, but I’m happy that we reached a good result.

FM/HY