36th FIFF Will Show 11 Preserved Classic Films

TEHRAN –(Iranart)- T he 36th Fajr International Film Festival (April 19-27 in Tehran) will screen 11 films in its ‘Classics Preserved’ section that deals with restored old films.

Four films from Iran and seven from other nations are scheduled for this part of the festival, ISNA reported.

The Iranian movies restored and prepared for the section are two feature-length and two short films. They have been restored at the archives office of the state-owned Islamic Republic of Iran Broadcasting.

One of the short films is ‘Arbaeen’. It is the Arabic term for 40 and the name of a major Shia mourning occasion held annually to mark the 40th day after the martyrdom of Imam Hussein (AS), the third Imam of Shia Muslims in the Karbala desert in Iraq in 680 AD. It is directed by filmmaker and screenwriter Nasser Taqvaee, 76, and is a documentation of religious traditions and rituals in the southern province of Bushehr.

A modified version of Taqvaee’s ‘Captain Khorshid,’ (1987) was screened in the Classics Preserved section of the 35th FIFF last April.

Another short work is a 1970 documentary by director, screenwriter and editor Parviz Kimiavi, 79. ‘Ya Zamen-e Ahou’ (Oh Guardian of Deers), refers to an epithet of Imam Reza (PBUH) used in Iran. The film depicts the strong emotional atmosphere existing inside the shrine of Imam Reza, the eighth imam of Shia Muslims.

The two restored feature films to be shown at the festival are ‘Amir Kabir’ by screenwriter and film director Ali Hatami (1944-1996) and ‘The Survivor’ by filmmaker Seyfollah Daad (1955-2009).

Hatami made ‘Amir Kabir’ using selected footages from his TV series named ‘Sultan Sahebqaran’ (an epithet of Nasser al-Din Shah of the Qajar Dynasty who ruled from 1848-1896 and to whom Amir Kabir was chief minister). The film will have its first public screening at the festival.

The Survivor is a 1995 drama about the Arab-Israeli conflict, based on ‘Returning to Haifa,’ a 1969 novel by Palestinian author Ghassan Kanafani, a leading member of the Popular Front for Liberation of Palestine, assassinated in 1972 by the Israeli spy agency Mossad.

Names of the seven foreign restored films have not been announced yet.

The 36th FIFF will show some of the best films made in and outside Iran in its various sections. Celebrated filmmaker Reza Mirkarimi will serve as secretary of the festival for the third consecutive year. The event has been held independently from the national Fajr Film Festival for the past four years.