Iranian film wins at Cannes

CANNES: A movie by an Iranian who was arrested for his work in his home country won the Un Certain Regard competition at the Cannes Film Festival on Saturday, bolstering the country’s filmmakers’ reputation for defying the censors to make high-quality films.

A Man of Integrity, filmed in Iran but unlikely ever to be shown there due to censorship, is a tense drama about a man persecuted by powerful economic and political forces who refuses to bribe his way out of trouble.

Writer-director Mohammad Rasoulof, 45, was arrested alongside director Jafar Panahi in 2010 and sentenced to jail. He is free on bail and has continued to make films that explore political and moral corruption.

Rasoulof said he hoped the prize would make it easier for him to make films in Iran.

“I love Iran, but it’s like an alcoholic father. Sometimes it hits me,” he said.

Rasoulof ’s win comes three months after Asghar Farhadi won the Best Foreign Language Film Oscar for The Salesman.

“International support has really helped all filmmakers and especially me, by stopping the pressure they were putting on us,” Rasoulof said, adding that the Iranian authorities had given him a permit to shoot A Man of Integrity but only after he signed a paper promising not to make it “too dark”. Reuters