Farhadi and Cast at Cannes Make Iranians Proud
Iranian feature-length Foroushandeh (The Salesman) has ripped two prestigious awards at the 69th edition of the Cannes Film Festival. Auteur director Asghar Farhadi won the award for the best screenplay while the lead male star, Shahab Hosseini, landed the award for the best actor. Vincent Cassel, Javier Bardem, Laurent Lafitte, and Adam Driver were the other nominees for this year’s best actor award.
Farhadi’s latest film joined the competition at the eleventh hour and received a mixed welcome by film critics. The film is apparently a multi-layered moral tale cooked with Farhadi’s signature social-realist approach, seasoned with outstanding performances by stars Taraneh Alidoosti (Rana) and Shahab Hosseini (Emad). They play a couple who are part-time actors playing Willy and Linda Loman in a Tehran production of Arthur Miller’s Death of a Salesman, when an intruder in their new home leaves Rana with a serious head wound, according to Telegraph. The film explores the themes of marriage, privacy, suspicion, revenge, honor and violence.
Farhadi has said the film is a tribute to all the things he loves; Iranian writer Gholamhossein Saedi and director Dariush Mehrjui for the story then film Gaav (aka The Cow), theater, and a song named Rana with the female vocalist Moluouk Zarrabi. The scenario is believed to have much in common with Facts about Leila, Daughter of Edrisa film script written by another acclaimed Iranian director Bahram Beyzaie.
Even before the closing ceremony of the Cannes, Foroushandeh’s premiere had turned heads, especially in Iran. Taraneh Alidoosti’s charming outfits prompted an online fervor, with many celebrating her boldness and tact while others tried to troll her. People also hailed her tears while costar Hosseini thanked her during his winning speech. He said he would like to dedicate his award to Iranians with “all my love, with all my heart”.
Farhadi’s earlier success with About Elly and A Separation are now complemented as a harbinger of a renaissance for Iran’s post-revolutionary cinema. A decade and a half apart from the Iranian new wave in the late 1990s, with frontrunners like Abbas Kiarostami, Farhadi’s cinema has brought every critical and commercial breakthrough possible. He has brushed past every prestigious award imaginable, including a first-time Academy Award for best foreign film for A Separation. In addition to his own films that find producers abroad, in France, Spain, or the United States, other Iranian directors are also finding it easier to sell their rights. Mani Haghighi’s Enters the Dragon was produced under the banner of Dark Precursor Productions Company in association with Crossfade Films. German Match Factory picked up the international sales rights to the film, ahead of its competition in the Berlin Film Festival. Another Iranian representative in this year’s Cannes, Inversion, has also been taken by France’s Diaphana. Other recent movies including Lantouri, The Sound and The Fury and Life without Parole with their documentary natures are the next hopefuls in the line.
Another Iranian has also had her own share of grabbing international attention. In this year’s Cannes Film Festival, exiled Iranian actress Golshifteh Farahani also starred as the lead female in the famous American director Jim Jarmusch’s Paterson. A former costar with Shahab Hosseini in Farhadi’s About Elly, she has congratulated their recent wins.
Many Iranians have celebrated the achievements in popular social media as they feel such awards can restore the true image of Iran as a peace-making art-loving and civilized nation. Even cynics, who always say western festivals are politically inclined, have expressed their optimism about Farhadi’s fresh creation.