There are 58 women agents and producers from 32 countries attending this year’s Film Market, either trying to purchase or sell film distribution rights. As always, the festival has been big for women in all other categories and sections, celebrating their accomplishments in the business.

Women filmmakers come from places such as Estonia, Russia, Lithuania, South Korea, France, Iraq, Kazakhstan, Lebanon, Armenia, Slovenia, Britain, Sweden, and Bulgaria.

Women jurors come from India, Portugal, Georgia, Syria, Italy and Iran. Three women filmmakers are hosting a section dedicated to Chinese cinema. A woman filmmaker is hosting a section dedicated to German cinema. As well, women are holding filmmaking workshops, from a host of countries, including Netherlands, China, Germany, Romania and Italy.

As always, the official policy of FIFF is to have more women to make films, and the best way to make that happen is to celebrate the women leading the way and to share information with each other. The long-term goal is to celebrate a world cinema that is supportive of all gender and race, providing a platform and community for filmmakers to share resources, guidance and inspiration.

Presided over by award-winning writer and director Reza Mirkarimi, the 37th Fajr International Film Festival is underway in Tehran until April 26.

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A number of famous Iranian actors, actresses and directors took part in the opening of the festival, which will be showing 160 movies.

This year, the international film festival is focusing on German motion pictures in Europe and on Chinese films in Asia in a section reviewing “the foreign countries’ cinema”.

The 36th edition of the festival had focused on movies from Italy and Georgia.

The festival will go on until April 26.

Since 2015, the Fajr Film Festival has been held in two separate national and international categories.

In April 2018, American director Oliver Stone travelled to Iran to attend the 36th edition of the international film festival.

Stone hosted a workshop for filmmakers during the festival and also held a news conference. French actor Jean-Pierre Léaud and Italian producer Giovanni Spagnoletti were also attending the event.

Stone briefly visited the historical city of Isfahan in central Iran. This was the Hollywood director’s first visit to Iran.

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Chinese director Wang Xiaoshuai, Oscar-winning Dutch director and screenwriter Mike van Diem, Turkish actor and director Muzaffer Özdemir, and Iranian actor Navid Mohammadzadeh, are among those to decide winners of International Competition (Cinema Salvation) section.

Rounding out the International Competition jury are Macedonian actress Labina Mitevska, German film director Peter Fleischmann, and Iranian director and screenwriter Narges Abyar.

Members of the Jury for the Eastern Vista (Panorama of Films from Asian & Islamic Countries) are Iranian director Khosro Masoumi, Georgian director Rusudan Glurjidze, and Syrian producer Rehab Ayoub.

Interfaith Award Jury will include Iranian writer and researcher Seyyed Mohammad Hossein Navab, Portuguese director and producer Inês Mendes Gil, and Irish writer, director and producer Douglas P. Fahleson.

NETPAC Jury is made up of Indian writer, editor and translator Latika Padgaonkar, Iranian producer Seyyed Gholamreza Mousavi, and Pakistani writer and film critic Aijaz Gul.

Iranian actor and director Behrouz Shoeibi, Lebanese screenwriter and director Ghassan Salhab, and Iraqi film critic and editor Ammar Hadi Al-Arady, will select winner of the Best First Film Award.

International Critics Jury is comprised of Tajik film critic and director Sadullo Rakhimov, Iranian writer, film critic and director Robert Safarian, and German journalist and film critic Barbara Lorey.

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This includes a session discussing 40 years of Iranian cinema after the victory of 1979 Islamic Revolution. Other programs include workshops on screenwriting, producing, directing, cinematography, editing and set design.

An international conference will also be held to discuss state policies and plans designed to boost and promote national movie industries across the globe.

Here is a shortlist of international speakers:

John Hill, Professor of the School of Media Studies in Royal Holloway, University of London. His PhD is from the University of York. He is co-editor of Film Policy in a Globalised Cultural Economy (Routledge, 2018) (with Nobuko Kawashima).

Soyoung Kim, graduated in Cinema Studies from New York University, is Professor of Cinema Studies at Korean National University of Arts, chief editor of Trans: Journal of Visual Culture Studies, and editorial collective member for Inter-Asia Cultural Studies and Traces: A multilingual Journal of Cultural Theory and Translation.

Marijke de Valck, associate professor in media studies and program director of the master’s program Preservation and Presentation of the Moving Image. She holds a PhD from the University of Amsterdam. Her research is situated on the intersections of film/media studies, cultural studies and globalization studies focused on film festivals studies.

Tiago de Luca, Associate Professor in Film & Television Studies in University of Warwick. He holds an MA in Film Studies from UCL and a PhD in World Cinemas from the University of Leeds. His main research interests are: cinematic realism; time and duration in the cinema (especially slow cinema); and contemporary world cinema, with an emphasis on Brazilian and Latin American cinemas.

Presided over by writer and director Reza Mirkarimi, the 37th edition of Fajr International Film Festival will be held in Tehran on April 18-26.

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Head of International Affairs Amir Esfandiari said the judges include well-known foreign filmmakers and producers and prominent Iranians who will evaluate the participating movies in six different sections.

On the Festival’s jury panels, Esfandiari said there will be 5 foreign and 2 Iranian jury members for International Competition. Other sections such as Eastern Vista, Interfaith, and NETPAC will have between 3 to 5 judges.

He added that 1400 titles were submitted to the Secretariat of the festival, including 900 feature-length, 200 shorts and at least 300 documentaries. Some 109 titles have been chosen to screen and compete in different sections of this year’s Festival.

According to Esfandiari, over 255 international A-list guests, judges, university scholars, producers and agents are expected to take part in the cinematic event. This will include high-ranking delegates and representatives from 75 countries, as well.

Presided over by writer and director Reza Mirkarimi, the 37th edition of Fajr International Film Festival will be held in Tehran on 18-26 April.

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Barcelona-born Bosch is based in Havana and London. She began her career as a curator of Latin American films at the AFI before taking on the role of Deputy Director of the London Film Festival/ National Film Theatre where she remained for 10 years. Bosch moved to the industry side as co-founder of the Mexican company Tequila Gang. During this time she was involved with El Evangelio de las Maravillas (Divine) by Arturo Ripstein, Un Embrujo (Under a Spell) by Carlos Carrera, Calle 54 by Fernando Trueba, El Espinazo del Diablo (The Devil’s Backbone) by Guillermo del Toro, La Fiebre del Loco (Loco Fever) by Andres Wood, Lost in la Mancha by Keith Fulton and Louis Pepe, and Amores Perros by Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu and Nine Queens by Fabian Bielinsky.

In her intensive, hands-on producing workshop, students will explore the entire spectrum of the work of a film producer. An overview of production fundamentals includes a detailed introduction to the creative producing process, the creation of a film package, story and script analysis, as well as introduction to production management, including industry-standard scheduling and budgeting.

Presided over by award-winning writer and director  Reza Mirkarimi, the 37th edition of Fajr International Film Festival will be held in Tehran on April 18-26.

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In addition to the tech behind the screen, the Film Market will also have a program of great events and panel discussions spotlighting the incredible innovation in filmmaking and storytelling today – with the opportunity to spotlight some of the great technological work in film you will see this year.

This will include the right technology to help creators bring their ideas to life, including lighting, AR and VR equipment, editing tools, software, design, sound, seating, staging and projection manufacturers, supply and service.

The 2019 Film Market will be the official technology sponsor of the 2019 FIFF, which kicks off on April 18-26 in Tehran. The 37th edition of Fajr International Film Festival is presided over by award-winning film director and screenwriter Seyyed Reza Mirkarimi.

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All titles screening:

‘At Home among Strangers’: A 1974 Soviet film starring Yuri Bogatyryov and Anatoly Solonitsyn and directed by Nikita Mikhalkov. Some hail it as the most significant of films. Like many Soviet films of the period, it was mainly in color, but had certain short scenes in black and white.

‘Dersu Uzala’: A 1975 Soviet-Japanese co-production film directed by Akira Kurosawa, his first non-Japanese-language film and his first and only 70mm film.

‘Office Romance’: A Soviet comedy film directed by Eldar Ryazanov. It was filmed at Mosfilm and released in 1977. Office Romance was a box office success, the leader of Soviet film distribution in 1978 and still enjoys wide popularity in the former Soviet republics.

‘Uncle Vanya’: A 1970 film adaptation of the Anton Chekhov play of the same title and directed by Andrey Konchalovskiy.

‘Stalker’: A 1979 Soviet science fiction art film directed by Andrei Tarkovsky with a screenplay written by Boris and Arkady Strugatsky, loosely based on their novel Roadside Picnic (1972). The film combines elements of science fiction with dramatic philosophical and psychological themes.

‘The Rider Named Death’: A 2004 movie directed by Karen Shakhazarov. In pre-Soviet Russia, Boris Savinkov leads a terrorist faction of Socialist-Revolutionary Party members responsible for the deaths of governors and ministers.

‘Walking the Streets of Moscow’: A 1964 Soviet film directed by Georgiy Daneliya. The film premiered at the 1964 Cannes Film Festival and won a prize for the work of cameraman Vadim Yusov, best known for his subsequent collaboration with Andrei Tarkovsky.

Classics Preserved to Screen 5 Iranian Films

The Classics Preserved section will also present cinema premiere of 5 restored Iranian films. Among the premieres will be ‘The Runner’ (Amir Naderi), ‘The Scout’ (Ebrahim Hatamikia), ‘Telesm’ or ‘Talisman’ (Dariush Farhang), ‘Jadehay Sard’ or ‘Frosty Roads’ (Masoud Jafari Jozani), and ‘The Last Action’ (Varuzh Karim-Masihi).

Presided over by award-winning writer and director Reza Mirkarimi, the 37th edition of Fajr International Film Festival will be held in Tehran on April 18-26.

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The German award-winning production designer is scheduled to hold her workshop during the annual cinematic event in Tehran.

Buhr is known for her superb production designs in movies such as ‘The Lives of Other’ (2006) and ‘Never Look Away’ (2018), both directed by Florian Henckel von Donnersmarck. The former won foreign-language film Oscar, and the latter was nominated in the same category. Her other works include ‘The Bloom of Yesterday’ (2016), ‘In Between Worlds’ (2014), ‘The Poll Diaries’ (2010), and ‘When We Leave’ (2010).

Buhr’s production design is an intensive hands-on program designed to equip students and production designers with the latest conceptual and practical skills needed to succeed and thrive as professional designers in the film and television industry.

The workshop encourages students to discover their own conceptual approach to design for film while collaborating with fellow designers in the realization of short movies with high production values.

Presided over by writer and director Reza Mirkarimi, the 37th edition of Fajr International Film Festival will be held in Tehran on April 18-26.

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