Seven foreign classic movies will be screened in the Classics Preserved strand of this year’s Fajr International Film Festival.
The annual event will screen seven restored movies from Japan, France, Russia, Australia, Poland, and Czech, plus a joint production from Hong Kong and Taiwan.
The foreign movies in the Classics Preserved strand are as follows:
1- A Touch of Zen, a Hong Kong/Taiwan movie directed by King Hu which in 1975 won the Grand Prix Technique [an award voted not by the competition jury but by France’s film & TV technicians’ association] at Cannes.
2- Gate of Hell, a 1953 Japanese jidaigeki film directed by Teinosuke Kinugasa. It tells the story of a samurai who tries to marry a woman he rescues, only to discover that she is married.
3- The Rise and Fall of a Small Film Company, a 1986 French movie directed by Jean-Luc Godard, one of the most emblematic figures of film history, who intrinsically associated his name with the French New Wave and Cahiers du Cinema, and keeps shooting films to this date, thus changing the way in which cinema interacts with social reality.
4- The Assassin of the Tsar, a 1991 Russian drama film directed by Karen Shakhnazarov. It was entered into the 1991 Cannes Film Festival. There are two versions. One is filmed in English which later was dubbed over the Russian actors, and one in Russian.
5- Picnic at Hanging Rock, a 1975 Australian mystery drama film which was directed by Peter Weir. The movie takes place in February 1900, 11 months before the Australian colonies federated and 11 years before the creation of the Australian capital.
6- Dinner for Adele, a 1977 Czechoslovak comedy detective film directed by Oldrich Lipsky. Alternative titles were Adele Hasn’t Had Her Dinner Yet, Nick Carter in Prague, and Adele Hasn’t Had Her Supper Yet.
7- A Generation, a 1955 Polish film directed by Andrzej Wajda. It is based on the novel Pokolenie by Bohdan Czeszko, who also wrote the script.
The Classics Preserved will also screen four restored movies from Iran: Parviz Kimiavi’s Oh Guardian of Deer (Ya Zamen-e Ahou), Nasser Taghvai’s Arbaeen, Ali Hatami’s Amir Kabir, and Seifollah Daad’s The Survivor.
Oh Guardian of Deer (Ya Zamen-e Ahou) is made on the pilgrims who have gone to the holy shrine of Imam Reza (AS), the eighth Shia Imam, in the holy city of Mashhad.
Directed in 1970, Arbaeen (a Shia Muslim religious observance) is a short film that highlights the traditions and rituals of Arbaeen day observed in the southern Iranian city of Bushehr.
Amir Kabir is a re-edition of the TV series Sultan-e Sahebqaran (1976) compiled into a movie by its director. Screened for the first time, it narrates the story of reformist prime minister Mirza Taqi-Khan Amir-Kabir and his relations and struggles with the Shah of the time, the Qajar king Nasser ad-Din Shah.
The Survivor is a 1994 Iranian epic historical drama about Arab–Israeli conflict starring Salma Al-Masri, Alaa El Din Koksh, Ghassan Massoud, and Jamal Suleiman. The script is based upon Returning to Haifa, a novel by Ghassan Kanafani in 1969.
For all festivalgoers who are already planning their visit, check screening time and other information at www.fajriff.com, or email us at infor@fajriff.com. Presided over by Iranian film writer and director Reza Mirkarimi, the 36th edition of Fajr International Film Festival will be held in Tehran on April 19-27.
