Iranian Film Festival
Stay posted for updates about the Iranian Film Festival on 17, 18 and 19 October 2008 in Rotterdam
In a small theater in Rotterdam, there is Iranian music humming in the hall, people are either anxiously waiting in line to pick up their tickets or chatting in groups, while drinking a cup of tea around small round tables. The volunteers walk around the hall upbeat and excited, wearing their white t-shirts with a beautiful print of a phantasy bird on the front. It is the opening evening of the Iranian Film Festival, at last.
I’m one of the last people who gets into the movie theatre before the lights are dimmed. Looking around I notice that every single seat is filled. Parwin Mirrahimy takes the microphone and welcomes the audience. Then Farah Karimi holds a speech expressing the one thought that was just running through my mind: This festival is one of the very few occasions that brings us individualistic Iranians together in The Netherlands!
A warm applause follows. After seeing the movie “Three Women” by Manijeh Hekmat it is time for some looking around in the theater. In a corner an I-Mac shows a compilation of short movies by young Iranian film makers in Iran. There is a DJ booth, behind which DJ Ishtar is mixing Persian songs with Arabic and Western beats. There is a warm and friendly atmosphere and I almost feel like I’m visiting someone’s birthday party.
I get to know Katayoun and Sara. Katayoun, an art and history student has arranged the movie compilation on the I-Mac. She is enthusiastic as she tells me about her trips to Iran and meeting the film makers. Sara is one of the volunteers and her sparkling eyes show how excited she is that all the hard work she and the group invested during the last months is showing results. Parwin is talking to writer and poet Nafiss Nia in the hall, while eccentric film maker Mostafa Heravi takes a look at the work on the I-Mac. Sam Ali Kashani, who will be presenting his first movie on Sunday has just arrived from Los Angeles and is absorbing the atmosphere with his companion sitting at one of the reading tables in the middle of the hall.
This buzz remained for the next two days. Movies were scheduled in two separate theaters and the program was tight, leaving just a few minutes to inhale and exhale between the films. Saturday must have been a blast, but unfortunately, I wasn’t there to see Kiarostami’s “Ten” or Naghi Nematie’s “Those Three”. I’m sure DJ Tupic and Miss Dee got our “gher-addicted-Iranians” on the dance floor.
The Sunday program started with Eefje Blankevoort presenting a compilation of what she defined as “Iranian humor”. To show that Iranians too have some sense of humor she arranged some short clips from the movie “Marmoolak”, “Khabgahe Dokhtaran” and some Youtube clips, what she called “mollah-humor”. After seeing a mollah running his “company” of clerical telemarketeers and on-demand Quran mumbojumbo, I really enjoyed an animation film called “Fale Ghahveh” by Sarah Saeidan. This short cartoon showed the experience of a little Iranian boy seeing his mother and another woman sitting at the kitchen table doing a little fortune telling with coffee. The funniest thing was that the audio was recorded from back to front, making the people talk an unexisting language. At first I thought something had gone wrong in the moderating room, but it was actually meant to sound that way because the little boy, from whose perspective it was shown, couldn’t yet speak! I thought that was brilliant!
I had bought tickets for four movies in a row, forgetting that I also had to eat in between movies, so I ended up munching half a plate of “salade olovie” in 2 minutes.
The next movie was “Tehran:Another Side”. People had high expectations for this movie, since there wasn’t a single seat left empty in the theatre! The young movie maker himself, including his parents had come over from Los Angeles to see his movie being shown in public for the very first time. The movie itself reminded me of the so many home video’s people from the US or Europe made while on vacation in Iran. He asked people on the streets to respond on the notion that people in the US thought Iranians still ride around on camels, etc. He asked that for about 15 times during the movie and required the same answer 15 times. He could have made a very interesting “inside movie”, but was obviously limited due to his filming permit. It was a nice try though, but rather stereotype, which is funny since he was trying to put and end to certain stereotypes of Iran himself.
Actually, it would all be ok if you could oblige people to see both “Tehran: Another Side” and “Our Times” by Rakhshan Bani Etemad right after one another. 
Only then one could have a more balanced and realistic image of Iran. “Our Times” confused me in the beginning, not because I found it unbelievable to hear educated young people being so ignorant to think that after 4 years of Khatami he could actually keep his word for a next 4 years, after realizing 0 of his promises he earlier made to especially young people. It wasn’t that which caused my confusion, but the fact that the two young ladies being the Khatami supporters were actually two of Iran’s most popular silver screen actresses! Was the documentary a movie-documentary or were the two actresses at the time political activists who both coincidentally ended up in Iran’s movie industry? The second part of “Our Times” was startling and disturbing, putting emphasis on the impossible position of women in Iran.
After seeing so many movies, one needs some time to digest all the images and messages these movie makers try to bring across. Though the movies were all so different, the program was balanced and fresh. It made one see sides of Iranian movie art, that otherwise would be shared only with a small artistic elite, when one thinks of the works of for example Tala Madani and Sam Yazdanpanna. While resting at the theater restaurant my eyes cought a glimpse of some old friends. It made me think of Farah Karimi’s opening speech. One thing is for certain, this festival achieved something that otherwise would be impossible between Iranians: to accomplish unity!
IFF makes way for Iranian animation movies
Preparations for the third edition of the Iranian Film Festival in Rotterdam are taking place in full speed. In the meantime more details about the contributors are being revealed. Though the organization still leaves some space for their much promising ‘surprises’, they can already mention some names of Iranian diasporas who will play a role during this three-days festival.
It is obvious that the IFF is becoming a multidisciplinary festival with a wide variety in its program offer. After the success of the first widely known animation movie Persepolis by Marjane Satrapi, animation movies have obtained a more appreciated place in the (Iranian) cinema scene. 
Tala Madani and Sam Yazdanpanna Ardekani are two young artists who will present their animation movies. Tala, who is an American-Iranian artist in residence at the Amsterdam Royal Academy, studied art at Yale University and exposed her work at the Saatchi Gallery in Londen.
Sam Yazdanpanna Ardekani came to live in The Netherlands in 1997 and studied Audiovisual art at the famous Rietveld Academy. In his animation movies, he stresses the sense of longing for his homeland and the search for a new identity.
The Rietveld Academy produced another talented Iranian artist, namely Mostafa Heravi. He will present his movie The supper, that is loosely based on the last supper of Jesus Christ, the famous painting by Leonardo da Vinci. In this movie Heravi shows us two interpretations of this image: Christ’s betrayal and the emancipation of women.
Nothing is what it seems, movie maker Farshad Aria proves this in his short movie Lost in Between. Remy van Heugten also proves this in his television movie called Sharam and Abbas. In this tragic comedy two Iranian refugees in The Netherlands pretend to be a homosexual couple in order to obtain an asylum status. It is difficult though for the lonely adventurer Shahram and the serious journalist Abbas to keep up appearances until the end.
The festival program is elaborated with discussions, speeches and book presentations of various Dutch and Iranian Dutch-Iranian contributors.
Visit the website for more information about the program and ticket sale.
www.iraansfilmfestival.nl
Experimental Iranian Movies at IFF
In two weeks time the Iranian Film Festival is going to take place in Rotterdam. Farah Karimi (director of Oxfam/Novib) is going to hold the opening speech during this festival. I am thrilled that I will be meeting her again. Ms.Karimi, regardless of her political views, belongs to a very small group of Iranian women who has achieved a notable position in Europe’s political and societal scene.
It was thanks to her efforts that several independent media organizations received funds to focus on news and information regarding democracy and human rights in Iran. She is highly respected in the development policy arena and has played a major role in negotiating with Afghani officials on human rights and democratic governance reforms. During her time as Member of Parliament she focused on human rights issues in the Middle East, fore mostly on Iran.
I am also very eager to see the movie Those Three (Naghi Nematie, 2007) which is planned for Saturday and Sunday. This is a movie about the loneliness of three young soldiers Yousef, Dariush and Essi who are on a military training in the mountains.
Another movie that raises my curiosity is Maziar Miri’s Gradually (Maziar Miri, 2005) in which Seyed Mahmoud who is working on a railway far from home hears his mentally instable wife has gone missing. Seyed returns to Teheran and begins his search for his beloved wife. This movie has been selected by several movie festivals.
During the Iranian Film Festival there are several movies of Rakhshan Bani Etemad which will be shown. One of these movies is called Our Times (2002). In Our Times she shows hectical and confusing situations, but also hope of young women in today’s Iran during the re-election of president Khatami in 2001.
Personally, I am very fond of art videos, but you have to have seen a few to know what you’re looking at. For those who are in for some experimental movies, there is enough to choose from during the IFF, such as the art video The Supper (Mostafa Heravi, 2008) and a compilation of animation movies by the Iranian-American artist Tala Madani. Iranian-Dutch Katayoun Arian and Sara Mohammadi arranged a programme of recent Iranian art videos, which is very promising as well.
An interview with the founder and managing director of the Iranian Film Festival, Parwin Mirrahimy
by Tina Ehrami
“The position of women in Iran’s society” is this year’s theme at the third edition of the Iranian Film Festival (IFF) in Rotterdam. It is time to meet the woman behind the festival. Founder and managing director Parwin Mirrahimy (1980) proudly elaborates on the success story of what might be the most appreciated film festival in Europe for independent Iranian cinema.
Parwin is in a middle of a conversation with one of the IFF volunteers in café de Balie in Amsterdam, when I arrive too late and all whet due to another Dutch September rain storm. Like a committed and skilled manager who is in the business for years, she delegates tasks and preparations for the Iranian Film Festival. It is a lot of work to organize a three day long festival while having a fulltime job. As a program manager at an idealistic organization she unites people of different cultural backgrounds by introducing art and film-related projects. Parwin speaks enthusiastically about the variety she is going to offer in the program of the IFF 2008.
She was only 5 months old when her parents brought her to The Netherlands. Since they did not want to cause cultural confusion at such a young age, they gave her a Dutch upbringing, but always held her close to her Iranian roots by having telephone conversations with her family in Iran. At the age of 9 she saw her first Iranian movie, which instantly caused her fascination for Iranian cinema. At the end of her study Film and Television Sciences in Amsterdam she wrote her final thesis on the development of Iranian film since the Islamic revolution and the implementation of censorship. This way she made an in-depth study of the Iranian cinema and was deeply touched by the drive of independent movie makers who managed to express themselves in their own original way despite of the many restrictions and limitations.
Her fascination for Iranian cinema and her wish to share this with others inspired her to realize a film presentation in 2006 at the age of 26, while having very little experience of organizing such an event. “I learned a lot through those experiences. It was a great success eventually and the Iranian public appreciated it very much. But I had to learn from it by making many mistakes.” As one of her beginner’s mistakes she says: “I was so naïve to think that I would receive funds by writing a single nice letter. As a response I received a rather surprised letter back asking me if I would be so kind to first fill out a pile of forms, register a foundation, open an account, etc, etc. At the end all worked out fine.” It definitely worked out fine considering the program she was able to present at the IFF 2006, with films such as
20 Fingers (Mania Akbari, 2006) the documentary Nose, Iranian Style (Mehrdad Oskouei, 2005) and Tehran 7 A.M (Amir Shahab Razavian, 2003).
Parwin invests much time and energy in the IFF and has travelled to Iran four times already in order to stay in touch with the Farabi Cinema Foundation. “I think it’s very important to have a professional approach and I am very pleased with the many help I receive from volunteers who work for the IFF with me.”
The following year (2007) the Iranian Film Festival grew from a one-day film presentation to a three-day film festival, once again with much success. “I am very careful when choosing the movies. I don’t think it’s important to show the biggest movies by the most famous movie makers, but to give young and starting movie makers a chance as well. I do take some risks, but it’s more important to me to include the works of young Iranian movie makers and artists. Sometimes it’s their first movie, sometimes it’s not entirely perfect, but it’s an honest and sincere story they bring across.” When it comes to music, the IFF offers much variety. In 2006 Nava Music and Jan Pieter van der Giessen performed, in 2007 the visitors were surprised with a guest performance of Mohsen Namjoo and a little later they all stood up and danced on their theatre chairs to the music of “Caspian Hat Dance.”
“With the IFF I try to build a bridge between Iran and the West. Sometimes the program of the IFF presents critical views on life in Iran and sometimes the views are a bit lighter. I try to keep a balance.” Especially after showing the movie Mainline (Rakhshan Bani-Etemad en Mohsen Abdolvahab, 2006) Parwin heard visitors saying they found the message rather critical. “This year I’ve paid more attention to this matter by trying to find a balance in the movies we present at the IFF 2008. I’ve also included the movie Tehran: Another Side (Sam Ali Kashani, 2008) in the festival program. It’s going to be a Dutch premiere! The story is about a young Iranian man who is raised in Los Angeles and visits Iran for the first time. The movie shows his personal experiences, and his views.” Parwin reaches a large public with the IFF, including both young and old visitors, Iranians from the Benelux region and also (approximately 50%) Dutch natives.
Parwin is very pleased with this year’s IFF program. “Female movie makers take the lead,” she laughs. Iranian artist and movie maker Mania Akbari comes to present the movie “Ten” (Kiarostami, 2002) and her own movie 10+4 (Akbari, 2004). Akbari, known for her much praised movie 20 Fingers (IFF, 2006) shows her own story of a woman with breast cancer in the movie 10+4. After the movie presentations she speaks with the visitors. This year the IFF also presents Mina Keshavarz (1984) who followed a rock band in Iran for a year. Since public performances are forbidden, the band decides to give a secret concert. After that problems start with the authorities. At The End Of A Perfect Day is Keshavarz’ first movie. Visitors of the IFF can converse with the independent movie makers and artists during the breaks while enjoying a cup of Persian tea and snacks. For music lovers Miss Dee and DJ Tupic will perform after the movie presentations. The third edition of the Iranian Film Festival takes place at the Lantaren/Venster in Rotterdam, The Netherlands from 17 to 19 October 2008.
www.IraansFilmFestival.nl
