PREVIEW: 2023 IRANIAN FILM FESTIVAL AUSTRALIA

The Iranian Film Festival of Australia (IFFA) will celebrate the resilience and creativity of Iranian cinema at this year’s event. The festival takes on a sombre but defiant tone in 2023, in the wake of the murder of Dariush Mehrjui, the acclaimed director of such iconic Iranian films as The Cow (1969) and The Pear Tree (1998); on October 14, the filmmaker and his wife were found stabbed to death in their home in Karaj, near Tehran. A retrospective of his work has been curated to honour his legacy.

Forced to pause in 2022 in response to the social and political changes in Iran, the IFFA returns with thirteen films, including eleven Australian premieres, as well as six award winning shorts. “The 11th IFFA carries extra significance this year,” said Festival Director Armin Miladi. “We’ve shifted our focus to films about filmmaking, particularly highlighting the burgeoning underground cinema movement in Iran. Amid bans and societal divides, a new wave of underground and independent cinema has emerged, demonstrating the resilience of Iranian filmmakers.”

Opening this year’s festival is The LOCUST (pictured, right), written and directed by Faeze Azizkhani and winner of this year’s Global Award at the South By Southwest Festival. The film stars Pegah Ahangarani, who has now left Iran, and Hanieh Tavassoli, who was temporarily detained this year because of her political remarks on social media.

Closing the Festival is WINNERS, written and directed by Hassan Nazzer, and the United Kingdom’s official entry for the International Film Oscar. Set In a small provincial Iranian town, children working hard to support their families unearth a precious statue and set out to find the owner.

Iran’s controversial entry for the 2024 Academy Awards is THE NIGHT GUARDIAN, directed by Reza Mirkarimi.Forced to leave his village due to drought, a man takes a job as a night guardian at a construction site…something wrong is going on. As strange circumstances unfold around him, Rasoul finds himself trapped.

Two documentaries honour Iranian filmmakers who inspire audiences worldwide. SEE YOU FRIDAY, ROBINSON, direct from its world premiere at the 2022 Berlinale in 2022 is an ode to the friendship between two cinema greats - Jean Luc Godard and the late Ebrahim Golestan. Director Mitra Farahani’s film presents an insight into the role of the artist in the 20th and 21st centuries, with razor-sharp insight and humour. And KIAROSTAMI AT WORK showcases Abbas Kiarostami's boundless passion for work and creativity. The film features images captured by director Seifollah Samadian during their thirty years of friendship.

Other works include ZAPATA, Danesh Eqbashavi’s story of a young writer who tries to help her cousin make his next film, only to find the course of their lives altered irrevocably; DARK MATTER, written and directed by Karim Lakzadeh, about two actors rejected for career-changing roles who then set out to make their own film; and, Vahid Jalilvand’s gripping psychological thriller, BEYOND THE WALL, in which a near-blind man hides a terrified mother from the police after a protest turns into a riot.

But it will likely be the rare screening of THE COW that draws the bulk of the interest. Neorealism, surrealism and mysticism meld in this groundbreaking, deeply moving ‘Iranian New Wave’ masterpiece. Despite being funded by the Iranian government, the film was immediately banned due to its negative portrayal of rural Iranian poverty. It was smuggled to the Venice Film Festival in 1971 - two years after completion - where it won the FIPRESCI Critics’ Prize. The IFFA will screen Dariush Mehrjui’s film with a never-before-seen making-of featurette.

The Iranian Film Festival of Australia 2023 screens in the following locations:
Sydney 16 – 22 Nov, Dendy Newtown
Canberra 17 – 19 Nov, NFSA ARC cinema
Melbourne 23 – 29 Nov, Cinema Nova
Brisbane 30 Nov – 6 Dec, Elizabeth Pic Theatre
Adelaide 1 – 3 Dec, Mercury Cinema
Perth 7 – 13 Dec, Luna Cinema Leederville